new little coil

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

Original poster: "Dave S by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <dschulth-at-shaw.ca>

Hello everyone....

This is my first posting here, but I have been reading this list for a few
months now.

I recently finished building a new coil, and took a couple of pics of my
makeshift setup to share with everyone! heres the link: 

http://www.85merk-dot-com/members/daves/tssm.jpg

Its powered by a 12/30 NST, a single static gap, and three wine bottle
capacitors.
the secondary is 1.5" x 12" tall, the primary is 15 turns of 12 gauge solid
wire.

so far my sparks have been a healthy 6-7".

It is weird though, this little coil only seem to run good with that tiny
solid cast iron ball on top (or nothing at all). As soon as I add a bigger
topload (copper toilet bowl float) my sparks almost completely vanish, even
with much tuning of the cap, gap, and primary..???

Any input would be great!! (besides my obvious saftey issues, as they have
mostly been taken care of with the addition of neon sign wire)

thanks, dave schultheis