small tesla-- coil ignition coil powered

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

Original poster: "margaret louise" <tullera-at-optusnet-dot-com.au> 

Hi, i am considering building my first tesla coil, but im kinda stuck with 
a few things:
(there are way to many questions here for one post....any help on anything 
greatly apreciated)

i am planning on building a small tabletop coil, based largley upon Herbert 
Mehlhose's :bonsai 
Coil"(<http://home.wtal.de/herbs_teslapage/model3.html>http://home.wtal.de/herbs_teslapage/model3.html), 
which i hope will give around 15 cm streamers (has a 2.2 nf cap).
  Unfortunatley im on a pretty tight budget, and i dont have a NST, or 
convenient acess to find one (rural Australia) but i do have 2 car ignition 
coils, and have seen a number of sights about that saycoils can be used for 
small TC use


1. can 2 car ignition coils give this sort of thoughroughput to drive a 
coil with the above output?

2.  does anyone have a circuit that they can email me 
(<mailto:tullera-at-optusnet-dot-com.au>tullera-at-optusnet-dot-com.au) that will drive 
the coils suitably. ive seen a number of drivers but all of the decent 
higher powered ones seem to run in the low Khz, so would any modifications 
to the coil design need to be made to account forthe much higher than 
normal "line frequency" and the squre-wave output?

3. what is the best  secondary coil form?, PVC? is Cardboard Ok?
4. what about primary coil form, Does it really matter, or will i get RF 
losses with the wrong stuff?
5. does anyone have any ideas on how to measure output currents at High 
voltage. eg of NST's ignition coil setups etc?

thanks in andvance for any posts...........and if anyone has any advise or 
wants to help me design my coil and be bombarded with my questions.. email me!

             Ruben