Re: Variac blowing fuses (another newbie questin)

["Tesla list" <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Original poster: "Christoph Bohr" <cb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>

Hallo Folks.

Just an idea from someone who is
"so not an expert", but I wanted to share
my thoughts.

Quenching ist easier/better with a ground connecting
streamer I believe as energy is easily transferred out of
the system. Maybe the worse quenching leaves some
residual charge in the cap, which could increase power
factor as the cap does not draw execcive initial charging
current, as it is already charged to a cetrain value.
I am speaking of charge in the Cpri as a result of energy
flowing back from the secondary side, but I am not sure
if and how the charge could always have the right polarity.
Ok, maybe this is just a stupid idea... however

best regards

Christoph Bohr

----- Original Message -----
From: "Tesla list" <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, November 30, 2005 9:24 PM
Subject: RE: Variac blowing fuses (another newbie questin)


> Original poster: "Lau, Gary" <Gary.Lau@xxxxxx>
>
> On a tangent to this topic:
>
>  > - The fuse blows after I've dialed the variac up to full power from
>  > zero. It didn't blow immediately - rather, the coil ran for maybe
>  > 10-20 seconds.  I believe the variac was up to full power.  Both
>  > times, the fuse blew during strong continuous arc to grounded
>  > target.  Hasn't happened when streamers were not striking
>  > anything.  I always power up starting the variac at zero.
>
> I have heard many reports that the mains current draw is highest when
> streamers connect to a grounded target, but I can't think of any
> explanation that would change the primary-side dynamics as a function of
> whether the streamers find a target.  I monitored the current to my mini
> coil, but couldn't see any change as I moved the target.  I have not
> tried this with my big coil.
>
> Can anyone suggest an explanation?  I can see that it will quench sooner
> with a connected streamer, and this in theory would allow a higher
> percentage of time that the cap can charge, and slightly higher break
> rate, but I would guess this would be negligible.  I'll have to try that
> with my big coil with a sync gap some time.
>
> Thanks, Gary Lau
> MA, USA
>
>
>