RE: THOR Bang energy vs. streamer length measured

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

Original poster: "Steve Conner" <steve.conner-at-optosci-dot-com> 

 >Your data suggest that 120 BPS is too low and
 >could greatly hinder streamer distance.  If that is true, we can fix
that...


In some cases :P Steve Ward's ISSTC-2 ran at 100 (or was it 120) bps, and
produced 11ft 4ins with something like 4-5kW. That is a very efficient
performance.

I have reproduced this phenomenon on a smaller scale. I hooked up my Tesla-2
spark gap coil as a DRSSTC, and I was able to get 36" arcs to ground at
around 70 bps.

This is roughly the same output as I got at 400bps using the spark gap, but
using something like 50% of the power (I measured about 1.2A at 400v dc
going into the H-bridge)

Now, at 70bps with the spark gap, I just got a silly looking fuzz of corona.
And, running the DRSSTC at higher break rates didn't seem to make the
streamers longer, it just made them hotter and more branched. So, I would
say that the optimum BPS for a given coil may not be a constant, but instead
depend on the bang energy and maybe the RF envelope shape.

Sadly, the "Dirty DRSSTC" exploded violently before I got any more accurate
measurements, scope traces, or spark pictures :(

http://scopeboy-dot-com/tesla/dw-isstc/p2/igbt_explosion_1.jpg
http://scopeboy-dot-com/tesla/dw-isstc/p2/igbt_explosion_2.jpg

http://scopeboy-dot-com/tesla/dw-isstc/p2/dw2.html

Steve C.

http://www.scopeboy-dot-com/
"We blow IGBTs so you don't have to"