Re: VTTC provisional results

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

Original poster: "by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>" <FutureT-at-aol-dot-com>

In a message dated 3/15/01 10:43:42 PM Eastern Standard Time, 
tesla-at-pupman-dot-com writes:

> 
>  > Original poster: "Herwig Roscher by way of Terry Fritz
>  <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>" <herwig.roscher-at-gmx.de>
>  > 
>  > Hi all,
>  > 
>  > After having finished a series of tests I would like to inform you of
>  > the results and , of course  :-)  , I have a few questions as well.
>  
>  > I am getting a bunch of branched streamers which are
>  > accompanied half of their length by thick blue seams. Occational
>  > thick arcs to a grounded rod at a distance of 17". Should I be
>  > satisfied?

Herwig,

My guess is that the coil is maxed out for filtered DC operation. 
DC VTTC sparks tend to be much shorter than raw AC ones.  You
mentioned that there are individual streamers.  This makes me
think that the filtering is not very good.  Usually a well-filtered
DC coil will give a sort of plasma discharge without much in the
way of individual streamers.  I do think you said your supply is
filtered, please forgive me if I'm mistaken.  I forget if you said
you're using some sort of staccato or pulsing action?

In any case, I use this formula to figure my spark lengths
for raw AC powered VTTC's:

   spark length (inches) = 0.48times sqrt input power (wallplug watts)

The sparks from filtered DC VTTC's tend to be about half the length
of raw AC VTTC sparks.

John Freau