Re: A laser pointer killed my coil?

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

Original poster: "Jonathan Peakall by way of Terry Fritz <teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>" <jpeakall-at-madlabs.info>

Not that I think the pointer killed the coil, but lasers do ionze the air.
They can be used to start a Marx bank for example. Of course, so can UV.

Jonathan Peakall

----- Original Message -----
From: "Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
To: <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
Sent: Tuesday, January 21, 2003 1:22 PM
Subject: Re: A laser pointer killed my coil?


 > Original poster: "Chris Roberts by way of Terry Fritz
<teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>" <quezacotl_14000000000000-at-yahoo-dot-com>
 >
 >
 > The main reason I thought something happened was because someone told me
 > that the laser ionizes the air and makes a path for the high voltage to
 > follow. I doubt this, it seems like a rumor. Just wanted to see if anyone
 > else had heard of this.
 >
 >   Tesla list <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com> wrote:
 > Original poster: "c d by way of Terry Fritz "
 >
 > I had a similar experience
 > I was running the coil on a very humid windy night outside
 > hard to say for sure cause and effect, but I started the
 > coil and ran it for about 30 seconds with very nice output,
 > 3x 24 inch sparks.
 > Untill my friend pointed a laser at my secondary.
 > I saw it and shut the coil down immediately.
 > No apparent harm done I commensed operating the coil agian
 > to my suprise it would no longer output sparks. I checked every
 > connection, checked the capacitors, spark gap, transformers. Everything
 > was fine. So reluctantly I attached breakout points to the the
 > torus and got it to put out 1 meager 12 inch spark.
 > To this day that secondary does not seam to function as well.
 > I even built a new primary and the best I can manage is
 > 18 inch sparks. Thi! s secondary putout measured 26inch sparks
 > from 2 12000v30ma Nsts before the laser pointer.
 >
 > I have since wraped a very similar secondary and am planning
 > on testing it against the laser marked secondary to see if
 > it really has been damaged. As soon as my garage warms up.
 >
 > Honestly It freaked me out
 > wanted to ask you guys about it
 > but I was thinking I was totaly crazy.
 > Was just going to test it out and then say something, been
 > critisized for non scientific contributions :) needed some data
 >
 > I used laquer as my coating for the secondary.
 > On 26awg on Plexiglass tube.
 >
 > Chris
 >
 >
 >
 > -Chris
 >
 > "Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm
 > not sure about the former." -Albert Einstein
 >
 >
 >
 >
 >