Re: magnetic fields in spark gaps

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

Original poster: "Antonio Carlos M. de Queiroz" <acmdq-at-uol-dot-com.br> 

Tesla list wrote:
 >
 > Original poster: Mike <megavolts61-at-yahoo-dot-com>

 > If you go to this
 > page:
 > 
<http://www.geocities-dot-com/CapeCanaveral/Hangar/6160/>http://www.geocities-dot-com/CapeCanaveral/Hangar/6160/
 > , a little more than halfway down, there is a drawing of a plasma shock
 > wave generater that would, if used without the plasma chamber, could
 > possibly be used as a self-magnetic quenching gap. Even though we would
 > have a LC (add an inductor to the drawing) circuit, the magnetic fields
 > would always be in opposition causing the arc to be pushed away from the
 > conductor.  I would imagine some good insulator(mica comes to mind) would
 > be needed to allow the conductor to be in close proximity to the gap
 > without shorting the circuit.

There is a problem with the idea. The arc current is what creates the
field,
and the field is proportional to the current, so when the field is
maximum (not much with a single wire) the current is maximum too.

That idea is just the XVIII century "thunder house" experiment, without
help of explosives. A HUGE discharge is necessary to make a barely
perceptible force (I tried).

Antonio Carlos M. de Queiroz