Streamer Brilliance Re: arc brilliance

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

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

In part: I speculate:



>>Tesla Coil arcs often appear more illuminated at their

>>ends where they attach to struck objects.

         Two thoughts:
                 _appear_ may be part of the issue:
                 human vision is easily misled.
         More significant, i think:
                 'brilliance' depends on a number of factors.
                 Material from the 'struck' item can and does
                 'vaporize' and add to the illumination:
                 The bulk of the spark length is a 'wire'
                 with relatively low loss (thus: low
                 brilliance.), with most of the energy
                 (i suspect) being 'lost' in the material
                 at the end.
         (eg:
         In the similar case of an arc lamp, on examination,
         most of the light comes from the 'crater' in the
         electrode.  (the counter speculation is that the
         gas column, in, eg a neon tube provides 'all' the
         light.  The 'streamer from coil case' combines both
         these, at least when an object is struck.)
         best
         dwp

...the net of a million lies...
         Vernor Vinge
There are Many Web Sites which Say Many Things.
         -me