Re: Welder Weirdness

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

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

In a message dated 5/26/01 1:56:11 PM Eastern Daylight Time, tesla-at-pupman-dot-com 
writes:

> I also suspect that the coil system is far, far more
>  efficient when using the welder as ballast as opposed
>  to the twin MOTs.  I think I'm actually getting
>  longer, brighter sparks with much less current, as
>  evidenced by the cool power cord and spark gap. I wish
>  a had a big analog ammeter.
>  
>  Any of you welder/pig users have insight to share?
>  
>  Greg

Greg,

My guess is that the welder is indeed much more efficient.
Two problems with the MOT ballast are;  1) it is not adjustable,
2) the wire is kind of thin, and the core is kind of small, which
may give a lot of losses.  I do know that the type of ballast is
very important.  I once used a 120V, 20A variac as a ballast
for my 600 watt PT powered TC, and the coil drew 1200 watts
using the variac as a ballast, but drew only 600 watts using
my homemade ballast.  The welder is probably handling the
peak power better.  Some folks say welders are the best,
others say they got poor results.  There seems to still be a
lot of controvery about ballasting issues.

John Freau.