RE: rotary gap: disc with holes?

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

Original poster: "terry oxandale by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <toxandale-at-cei-dot-net>

I'm guessing the trailing side of the holes (arcing gaps) will quickly
carbon over due to the heat from the arc as the disc interrupts the arc.
That in itself is not a big problem as the arc should quench itself, but it
would seem that eventually the traking will take it's toll on the disc. The
disc probably needs to be fairly thin, and being it's Plexiglass, I would be
real concerned about it getting soft in the vicinity of the arc. I would
experiment first with low speed or small diameter first and find out where
the bugs are going to be.

-----Original Message-----
From: Tesla list [mailto:tesla-at-pupman-dot-com]
Sent: Saturday, July 06, 2002 3:00 PM
To: tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
Subject: rotary gap: disc with holes?


Original poster: "Wells Campbell by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>"
<wellscampbell-at-onebox-dot-com>

hello,

has anyone tried building a rotary gap with holes in the disc instead
of electrodes? I was thinking about it, and it seems that the biggest
problem would be the wear on the disc by the arc, but an arc it seems
would wear an insulator less than a conductor, because electrons would
not actually be entering / exiting the material. The post about phenolic
discs for grinders got me thinking, with their nice evenly spaced holes,
etc.

has anyone tried this type of gap? I.m cobbling together a small one
now, with plexi, no less, to study if the arc heats the material, etc.
I'll post results.

--
Wells Campbell
wellscampbell-at-onebox-dot-com - email
(415) 430-2169 x3756 - voicemail/fax