Re: Tesla coil grounding and other questions

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

Original poster: FutureT-at-aol-dot-com 

In a message dated 2/17/04 9:22:34 AM Eastern Standard Time, 
tesla-at-pupman-dot-com writes:

>And it is a generic question too. For a 12kv, 30 ma,
>60 hz NST, the capacitor works out to be .0066uf. Yet you and alot of other
>designs use much bigger caps. How can you still tune?


JC,

Tuning with a larger cap is not a problem.  Just use fewer primary
tapped turns.  For example suppose a particular coil uses 12 turns
with a 0.0066uF cap for good tuning.  Then if you instead use a 0.014uF
cap, then you may need to use only 8 or 9 tapped turns in teh
primary.  In other words when you use a larger capacitance then
this has to be offset by using a smaller primary inductance to
maintain tune.  The computer program outputs may be giving you
a false impression of how this all works.  Again, simply use
fewer active turns on the primary with the larger cap, and you
will find the perfect tune point.  Neither the the cap value nor the
primary number of turns is set in stone.  If one is changed, then
the other must be changed to maintain tune.  Plug this all into
Bart's JavaTC and you'll see how it all works.

And yes, for best results use 1200 to 1500 turns of 28awg wire
on the secondary.

John