Re: 'true" spark length was Re: Desktop Bipolar Coil

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

Original poster: "Malcolm Watts by way of Terry Fritz <teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>" <m.j.watts-at-massey.ac.nz>

Hi Jim,

On 2 Jul 2003, at 19:18, Tesla list wrote:

 > Original poster: "Jim Lux by way of Terry Fritz <teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>" 
<jimlux-at-earthlink-dot-net>
 >
 >  > system or, to put it another way, a rather low output voltage/energy
 >  > storage ratio in the secondary. I dare say the result was also
 >  > dependent to a degree on the humidity content of the air at the time
 >  > (I recall it as being rather low).
 >  >
 >
 >  >From a purely theoretical standpoint, I wouldn't expect humidity to have a
 > huge effect.  Humidity has a big effect on static electricity machines where
 > you depend on a very high surface resistivity because the charging current
 > is so low.  On a TC, though, you've got energy to burn, and corona is
 > probably a bigger loss source than leakage.

I should have been more explicit. Humidity had little if anything to
do with the result of upping the breakrate - only with the actual
sparklength attained which I never mentioned. In SShot mode it was
about 7" attached, increasing to about 13" at 2 - 3BPS from memory.
Sorry for injecting noise and confusion.

Malcolm