Strange Phenomenon In DC Powered VTTC

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Original poster: "Cameron B. Prince" <cplists@xxxxxxxxxx>

Hey guys,

I got the DC power VTTC going tonight and noticed something I've never seen
before. The coil runs on a single MOT with a full wave rectifier and filter
cap at about 2kVDC. I'm getting a 3 inch discharge so far that is virtually
silent. I was playing around with the discharge drawing arcs. I noticed that
you can start an arc on the side of the torroid and it will begin to swirl
around the side of the torroid like a little tornado. This continues after
you pull away and I've seen it continue to run for almost a minute. This is
while the primary discharge output from the electrode continues.

It's a really neat display. I tried to capture it with my camera here:

http://www.teslauniverse.com/members/cprince/images/dc_vttc/DSC00127.JPG

Have any of you seen this before?

Thanks,
Cameron