2nd light of the "Green Monster"

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Original poster: "David Rieben" <drieben@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>

Hi all,

Just wanted share the experience of firing off the
"Green Monster" (so named because of the 1260
turns of #19 AWG green enamel magnet wire
wound on the 12x49 secondary coil). The "1st light"
was Saturday, July 23 at the home of fellow list
member Carl Litton here in Memphis. We had a
pretty good showing of about a dozen people that
braved 97 degree heat to watch it go. It did ok
(about 8 ft or so streamers) but definitely needed
some more tweeking since it is being powered by
a ballasted 15 kVA pig. Also, we were firing it out-
side on a sunny (and hot) day so only the ground
strikes really showed up. I got to figuring the main
reason that I wasn't getting over 10 ft was that my
coupling was too loose. So, once I transported it
back to my place, I promptly rectified that situation
and changed the verticle placement of the lower-
most secondary winding from 3 1/2" above the plane
of the top of the 5/8" tubing primary to about 1/2"
above it.

Well, tonight, August 5, at around 9:45 PM local
time (CDT) was "2nd light". I finally got around to pulling
her out on my driveway and trying her out with the improved
coupling. Firing at my own house had been a real or-
deal in the past but I had already set up my grounding
rods a good ways farther out from the house for this
firing and I didn't get any of the annoying alarm system
or garage door opener "frying" this time. That kept the wife
happier ;^) WOW! That coupling adjustment really perked
up the Green Monster :^) The only witnesses were my
14 year son and about four other family and neighbor children
ranging in age from 10 to 17. And one freigthened (or
angry) looking neighbor woman that peeked out her
front door :^0  I didn't really get a chance to properly measure
the spark length but the 12x56 toroid tophat stands a
good 7 1/2 ft above the ground and I was getting multiple
ground strikes that reached out a considerable distance
from the coil base before striking the ground. I would have
to estimate in the 10 to 12 or 13 ft range! Well, since that neigh-
bor woman across the street didn't look quite as entertained
by the show as the rest of us, I figured that I needed to go
ahead and wrap it up before 10 PM so after a few minutes
of firing, I shut her down and rolled her back into my garage.
I didn't have the time to tape it this time but hopefully, in the near
future, I can get some more witnesses and some pics and/or
video of it in action.

I know the latest craze in coiling is the DRSST coils whose out-
spark lengths seem to be able to beat the "Freau number" without any
trouble, but I personnally still love to fiddle with the monster, pole pig
powered SG coils. Once properly tuned in, their spark discharges are
nothing SHORT of awesome to me (pun intended) ;^) Of course, I'm also not
too electronically inclined either so  I'm still a little intimidated by the
electronic circuitry that must be mastered to build a DRSST properly.
If I ever did successfully construct and fire up a large DRSST, I might
would end up selling off all of my HV pulse caps and pole pigs and
replacing them with IBGTs and big 'lytic caps too, but for now, pole piggy
ARSG coils ROCK! ;^)


Happy coiling,
David Rieben