x-kW coils

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

Original poster: "Mike Novak by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <acmnovak-at-msn-dot-com>

Has anyone done testing on medium (>2kW) coils that shows trends in power
supply vs tank cap size & secondary coil diameter (l:w ratios) etc...?

I'm building my last coil, to have on hand for demos, which I'm hoping will
to 6 feet or better without a pig. I have a 66.3nF tank cap (mmc) and a SRSG
so far... For the secondary I've got access to some 18, 20, and 22 guage
wire which I'm thinking of using on a 8" former. I've looked at other coils
in this size range, and their designs cover a wide spectrum of ideas. Some
are based on John Freau's research (5.1:1 length:width ratio), while others
use a more stout, 3:1 ratio.  Would it hurt opperation to have more turns
than needed? ( I have enough 18 guage for a 8x40 which is what I'm leaning
towards).

I want to avoid using a pig like the plague- they are hard to get,
transport, power, and ballast. MOTs seem to be the most popular choice
lately, but I've been having a hard time locating two identical xformers. If
that doesn't pan out, I'm going to have to go with a homebrew unit (I've
always wanted to try that anyway). Anyhow :-), I'm unsure of what
voltage/current is best for my cap bank... It's a 12(series) x 8(parallel)
MMC array based on the .1uF 3kVdc GE snubbers.  Their life is expected to be
+4000hrs -at- 12kVac and only 160hrs -at- 15kVac, so I'm looking at around 14kV
max in order to keep the caps happy. Question: is it better to be reso with
larger coils? I don't know if the ol' 120bps LTR scenario will work as well
as it does on small coils...

I hate to say it, but I might have to re-config the MMC for 15kV -at- 40nF...
which would be slightly LTR from a 3kW source.

Does this sound appropriate for my goals? Up until now I've only built one
coil that operates >1kW and it didn't do all that well... ~4ft -at- 2kW... 8x24
secondary with 22 guage wire, 25nF saltwater bank, 12kV -at- 250mA... flat RQ
gap... no variac. Total waste of time (aka. "learning experience").

Comments?

-Mike