Re: Micro Tesla Coil design

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

Original poster: "Andy Cobaugh by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <kb3ewy-at-rcn-dot-com>

 >One thing to watch though is some bug zapper transformers (BZT's??) have a
 >potted secondary winding (a good thing), but within the potting is a
 >ceramic cap, in parallel with the secondary (bad), to zap the bugs that
 >much harder.  You may need to do some precision drilling to remove that. I
 >haven't yet looked at how easy it is to remove the current limiting shunts.

The first high voltage transformer that I ever used was a bug zapper
transformer.  I built a little coil out of it that could produce 1" sparks.
The circuit did not use a capacitor, just a spark gap in series with the
primary coil.  I later realized that it was because of this capacitor that
it even worked.  I managed later on to chip away at the epoxy and cut the
wires going to the cap.  I too hope to someday build a micro coil as soon as
I find some doorknob caps for it.

good luck with your micro coil!

Your high voltage enthusiast,

Andy C.
Ham Call: KB3EWY
http://www.hot-streamer-dot-com/kb3ewy