Re: I've lost my k. Can someone help me find it?

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

Original poster: "Daniel Barrett by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <dbarrett1-at-austin.rr-dot-com>

    > I am curious as to what is actually breaking down when racing arcs
happen.

    FWIW, I typically see an arc jump from either the primary or the bottom
of the coil to points 4 to 6 inches above the primary plane. My form is
minimally insulated- about 3 coats of MinWax clear polyurethane so it's not
surprising- I really need to soak the bottom foot of my coil in a much
thicker layer, I just didn't want to put anything more on the coil than I
had to keep the Q up.

> that maybe a ribbed insulation formed over the secondary may help (larger
> creepage distance, I think Gary Lau suggested this) or would the arcs just
> track under the insulation along the surface of the wire.

    Guessing here, but the tracking is probably the most insidious. If big
creepage disks are installed it will probably track under them or worse yet,
inside the coil form.
db