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Re: SSTC first light - Plasmasonic
Original poster: dhmccauley-at-spacecatlighting-dot-com
> Well tonight I wound the primary coil for my Plasmasonic SSTC and got
> everything together. Board set for Push Pull mode and close to 50% duty
> cycle, Variac, line cord to connect power to on board rectifier (sorry
Dan,
> I know you said push pull is to be used for cw filtered power).
Actually, you can run any type of input using push-pull. However, the
push-pull was incorporated for use in CW mode (audio modulated) so that
the average power would be reduced by almost 50% as deadtime is increased
greatly.
> I hooked it all up and at first I could light up a flourescent tube 2 feet
> away, then 4 feet way, then corona disharge off the breakout point.
Finally
> I was getting 12 to 14 inch arcs straight up in the air, white, blue and
> purple thick sparks. I then tried to draw an arc with a ground stick and
> the sparks almost vanished. After a slight retuning I was able to draw a
> firey orange arc about 8 to 10 inches to the stick. Alot more power than
a
> SGTC. I am happy with my results!
Great results. Yes, with the SSTCs, you will find that the circuit will
detune itself when objects are brought into the vicinity of the secondary
etc...
> Now to try to get single ended mode to work (more power??),
> Try full wave rectified and off a light dimmer then rectified.
> Try filtered DC.
> Oh yeh, make heat sinks for driver chips! -- IMPORTANT !!
Heat sinks are not required for the driver chips. I have built up seven (7)
PlasmaSonic and Plasmasonic II SSTCs so far using the parts list I specified
on my
website and my driver chips in all instances run cool. I've run both
push-pull (CW) and single-ended (half-rectified input) with frequencies up
to about 350kHz with
cool running of the driver chips. The fact your driver chips are getting
hot is an obvious symptom that something isn't done correct. Either the
cores are incorrectly
chosen, or the transformers aren't wound optimally. Instead of trying to
fix the symptom by adding heatsinks, you should try to find the cause and
fix that instead.
But good that you got it working!
Dan
> My secondary is the good secondary I use for my spark gap tesla coil.
It'l
> a 4.25 inch by 22 inch pvc tube wound with 26 gauge wire and coated with
13
> layer of polyurethane. Then a 3 x 12 inch toriod and a paper bill spike
> (you know, one of those sharp pointed spikes that sits on a desk) for a
> breakout point.
>
> Shaun Epp
>
> May the sparks fly!!
>
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