Letting out the magic smoke

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

Original poster: "Stolz, Mark by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <Mark.Stolz-at-st-systems-dot-com>

Hi All!

Well, I killed my first secondary.  Apparently my little 2.5" x 12"
secondary didn't like being run with approx. 4kVA.  I guess the 32 AWG wire
just had to give out.  Here are some pictures just prior to its untimely
death.

http://users2.ev1-dot-net/~nmyreality/tesla/J010910/

One thing that was interesting though was that while in its death throws it
was producing some amazing arcs.  We had measured strikes out to 39", but
while it died I swear we had some out to 4'.  They say that a lightbulb
burns brightest just prior to death and I guess the same holds true with
secondaries.

I reckon I should get my 8" coil finished now before I start going through
arc withdrawl. :-)

Mark Stolz
Houston, TX