Re: First light - NOTHING HAPPENED!

["Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>]

Original poster: "Malcolm Watts by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <m.j.watts-at-massey.ac.nz>

On 12 Jul 01, at 17:52, Tesla list wrote:

> Original poster: "Robert by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>"
<obiwan1186-at-sunflower-dot-com>
> 
> Bad results on the first light of my 4" coil. here's the specs
> 
> secondary - 4" pvc wound with 850 turns of 22 guage wire and sealed with
> polyurithane. sealed off with lexan discs. heavily grounded with 5, 15"
> sections of copper pipe pounded into soaking wet ground and wired in
> parallel.
> 
> primary - 8" inner diameter - 13 turns of 1/4" copper tubing spaced 1/4"
> apart on lexan supports
> 
> spark gap - RQ/TCBOR gap with 7 gaps, 1/2" copper pipe.
> 
> capacitor - 1 2L soda bottle with salt water on the inside and the
> outside.
> 
> topload - 2 pie pans bolted back-to-back and 4" aluminum dryer ducting.
> 
> power supply - 15/30 NST
> 
> I turned on the power and heard the spark gap firing but no sparks were
> breaking out at the top. i checked again to make sure i had it wired
> correctly, and it still didn't work. i tried getting 1" strikes to a
> grounded rod, still nothing. i then attempted to tune it by tapping into
> the primary at various locations. still nothing. i then tapped into
> other gaps in the RQ gap and tinkered with the primary to no avail. I
> then checked my tranny to make sure it hadn't fried but it worked
> perfectly. I decided to give up when it started raining, and i thought
> "rain+high voltage=ZZZZAAAAP" . Can anyone please tell me why it is not
> working??!!!

Hi Robert,
           There are two possible problems which spring to mind - 
lack of energy which makes breakout from your topload impossible 
and/or tuning. Can you draw sparks from the terminal with a grounded 
rod? If so, how long are they?

Regards,
Malcolm