RE: Cyclotron effect

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

Original poster: "sundog by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <sundog-at-timeship-dot-net>

Hi Gary, All,

I don't think it's the duty cycle of the disruptive coil that's too short, 
I think it's the lack of raw current to heat the air.  A VTTC's output 
voltage is so much lower, and the current is substantial.  Thinking about 
the VTTC's vs disruptive coils, a lot comes into play.  The VTTC is usually 
breaking out of a point placed on the topload, and that aids a lot in 
streamer formation in straight lines.  Another bit of food for thought, no 
matter what the polarity of the streamer, the tips of the branches are all 
at the same polarity, so I'd expect them to try to get as far from each 
other as they can. That helps me visualise the twin forked discharge I get 
from a flat-topped discharge rod.  the 2 streamers it makes are *always* 
180 deg apart.
         I think the branching of the streamers is affected a lot by the 
hot air around the streamer, though I'm curious why there's not much, if 
any, branching at the base of the spark.

  Everybody, will it help if I shoot a bunch of sequential pics of my 
quad833's output? I can set the Olympus for autodrive and get about 50 pics 
a minute (1.2 sec a pic), then repeat multiple times with different 
conditions.  I have plenty of webspace for it, but I want to know if 
there's interest before I do it.

Shad G2-1203



At 07:57 AM 3/13/02 -0700, you wrote:
>Original poster: "Lau, Gary by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" 
><Gary.Lau-at-compaq-dot-com>
>
>Perhaps a pulsed streamer (not CW), and hence pulsed airflow is needed, and
>the duty cycle of disruptive coils is too brief to achieve the effect?  If
>I were to put on special goggles that allowed me to see ionized vs.
>un-ionized air, I would see regions of ionized air moving along the axis of
>the streamers.  When the next on-time occurs, the ionized region will have
>moved further down the streamer.  If the airflow is also spiraling, this
>could affect the streamer in a corkscrew manor.
>
>I think the larger question is, why is it that VTTC & solid state coils,
>pulsed or CW, will generate straight streamers?  It may have to do with the
>nature of the airflow generated by the streamers, probably duty-cycle
>and/or envelope related.
>
>Gary Lau
>MA, USA
>
>Original poster: "Bert Hickman by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>"
><bert.hickman-at-aquila-dot-net>
>
>Gary,
>
>You may be onto something. I have had streamers come within a foot of my
>face on occasion from my disruptive coil - under these conditions, there
>was a definite sensation of air flow coming from the streamer tips.
>
>But why would spiral vortices seem to be only associated with pulsed
>VTTC and Solid State systems? Maybe a because we get a hot,
>longer-lived, discharge from follow through power once we achieve
>breakout and it's this combination??
>
>However, I don't remember ever seeing this happening on a true DC
>powered CW coil...  very curious!
>
>Best regards,
>
>-- Bert --
>--
>Bert Hickman
>Stoneridge Engineering
>Coins Shrunk Electromagnetically!
>http://www.teslamania-dot-com
>
>Tesla list wrote:
> >
> > Original poster: "Lau, Gary by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>"
><Gary.Lau-at-compaq-dot-com>
> >
> > IMHO, the mechanisms under discussion for the observed spiral streamers may
> > be making this way more complex than what is likely.
> >
> > Consider the classic ion motor - an S-shaped wire atop the top load that
> > produces airflow, hence thrust, from the point of discharge.  Any detached
> > streamers will also generate such airflow.  The streamer is quite likely to
> > be affected and moved by such airflow.  In most cases such movement will be
> > random and chaotic, and the thrust produced will also be chaotic.
> > Occasionally we have seen stable, vertical streamers, and the thrust would
> > be unidirectional.  Aerodynamic vortices are produced in the wake of planes
> > and cars.  I would be surprised if a similar effect does not occur as a
> > result of ionic thrust, and such vortices could displace streamers into the
> > observed shapes.
> >
> > Gary Lau
> > MA, USA
> >
> > Original poster: "Paul Nicholson by way of Terry Fritz
> > <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <paul-at-abelian.demon.co.uk>
> >
> > If a beam of charged particles was launched upwards from the center
> > of the toroid, they would continue straight up, unaffected by
> > the B field (since beam v x B is zero).
> >
> > But at any angle from the vertical they would form themselves into
> > a spiral (ish) path since v x B is now generally non-zero. If they
> > emerged horizontally from the toroid, they would curve either
> > upwards or downwards depending on the sign of their charge and the
> > B field polarity (assuming here that E is roughly radial from the
> > topload).
> >
> > Could this cyclotron mechanism also affect the path over which a
> > streamer forms?  Do the electrons in the leaders see a sufficient
> > v x B force to make a noticeable difference to their path?
> >
> > Can this account for the observed spiral discharges?
> >
> > <snip>

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Shad (Sundog)
G-2 #1203
"Ever stop to think, and forget to start again?"
-----------------------------------------------------------------------