Re: Ferrite Rod + Tesla Coils = Woah!

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

Original poster: "davep by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <davep-at-quik-dot-com>

(belatedly...)

Tesla list wrote:

> Original poster: "Neil Richardson by way of Terry Fritz
><twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <neil-at-opticalrealities-dot-com>
 
> The other day I built a small tesla coil in 1 hour, it is VERY badly
> built:  5 primary turns, 200~ secondary, very small. It works,
> very poorly, but it works, so thats kinda a start enuf to help you
> understand one. I tuned it a bit, and managed to get a 5mm arc to
> 10mm. Someone then told me that putting a ferrite rod in the coil
> would improve its performance, after all, i'm using a flyback for
> power with a 12V 1A supply.

> Guess what? I now get 1" arcs when I put my finger near to the thing!
> Its not really a tesla coil now,

	I fail to see why not.
	Tesla built cored coils, tho he went away from them.
	(he lacked ferrites....)

> but its good for 1 hours work and with very limited materials!

	Which brings up a couple of related points:
	Even further back, there was discussion of a tapped secondary.
	Has anyone tried a movable ferrite core in the base of the
	secondary.  Bottom is relatively low voltage.  Ferrite is
	relatively low loss, might allow 'tweaking' of the secondary.

	Just an idea...

	Also:
	ferrites come in all manner of types and varieties.  They have
	different physical/strength characteristics and different
	'electrical' characteristics....  When comparing results,
	this can lead to confusion.

	best
	dwp