Re: magnifier vs two coil system

["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 4/29/02 4:04:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time, tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
writes:


>
> John,
> Why does Richard Hull's magnifier and some of the other designs that I've
> read about use break rates of 1000bps or more? 



Brad,

I can't tell you why those designs use such a high break rate
with a small capacitor, but I can tell you that there's nothing
special about a magnifier that demands such a design.  Also
such a design offers no advantage.  If you do some experiments
you'll find this to be so.  Whatever design is best for a normal
two coil system, will also be best for a magnifier, regarding
break-rate and capacitor value.

They seem to use smaller

>
> capacitors and higher break rates. Also, I've seen the photos of small
> helical resonators producing very large arcs. 



That is true.  A small helical resonator can produce very large
sparks.  I would think one would not want to ignore the size
of the driver (secondary) though.

Richard seemed very excited

>
> about this in his writings. Has this fallen out of favor and does he no
> longer believe that this is the proper way to construct a coil?-----



Richard has mostly stopped his Tesla coil work.  I would not go
as far as to say that it is not a proper way to construct a coil.
A high breakrate, and small capacitor value works fine, for both
magnifiers and two coil systems.  I suspect that a large capacitor,
with low break rate is more "efficient" however..... at least
according to my work.  My point is that what works for magnifiers,
works equally well for two coil systems, and vice versa.

Cheers,
John