RE: Grounding

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

Original poster: "Lau, Gary by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <Gary.Lau-at-compaq-dot-com>

This is a controversial question!  I think most people including myself
ground the NST case, safety gap center, and secondary base all to the RF
ground.  It has been suggested that this may expose the NST
primary-to-core insulation to high voltage transients (which it
undoubtedly does).  Whether this is an actual NST failure mechanism
remains to be seen.

And yes, it is true that streamer performance may be totally unaffected
by what if anything your secondary base is connected to.  What you don't
see however is that the RF traveling through your household AC wiring is
probably far worse without a proper RF ground.

Regards, Gary Lau
MA, USA

>Original poster: "David Boss by way of Terry Fritz
<twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <d.boss-at-Center7-dot-com>
>
>I have a couple of questions regarding grounding my coild.  I've read
>conflicting information about what and where to ground.  I understand
that
>the secondary needs to be grounded to a seperate RF ground, by seperate
I
>mean seperate from my house ground.  Where should I ground the nst case
and
>safety gap?  Also, right now, my coil is producing 12" to 18" sparks
and
>that is consistent weather or not I have the secondary connected to
ground.
>I can have the secondary ground wire dangling in mid air and still get
those
>sparks.  Makes me wonder if my ground does anything at all.  I'm going
to
>pound a new rod into the ground and try that.  Any ideas?
>Thanks
>Dave