Re: Why the primary is a flat spiral?

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

Original poster: "BunnyKiller by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <bigfoo39-at-telocity-dot-com>

Tesla list wrote:

>Original poster: "Shaun Epp by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>"
<scepp-at-mts-dot-net>
>
>I did a demonstration to a group of Ham Radio people I know this evening and
>it went really well.  I demostrated the spark show, burning / stripping a
>CD, tube light lite from a distance and on top of the coil.  They where all
>impressed, I even recieved  a round of applause   : ^ ) .  One woman asked
>me why the primary coil was flat and I was somewhat stumped.  I just
>explained that its used to couple the energy into the the secondary.  Now
>I'm wondering what to tell the next person, something to do with coupling?
>
>What other stage tricks do others do?
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Hi Shaun...

the primary is in its flat form to
1.   keep coupling to a minimum value
2.   to reduce the height to minimize strikes to it
3.   to make adjustments a bit easier when tuning
4.   and its a bit easier to mount a primary in this configuration...

a helical style primary offers the most coupling to the secondary ( but 
it increases the chance of secondary arc-over) normally it is used on 
small low power coils where high/strong coupling is needed.

one of the "tricks" I would do is show how glass isnt a good insulator 
and place a 6 foot long glass rod between the topload and a ground wire 
and watch the streamers travel along the glass rod to the ground. ( 
normally the streamer would only be 3 feet long thru air)


Scot  D