ignition coil based jacob's ladder...some questions

["Tesla list" <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Original poster: "Ryckmans, Thomas" <Thomas.Ryckmans@xxxxxxxxxx>

Folks,

I would appreciate your comments on this...

http://hot-streamer.com/temp/IgnitionCoil-BasedJacobsLadder.gif

I've build a simple jacob's ladder using Greg Hunter's
(http://hot-streamer.com/greg) circuit (see gif attached) on 220V 50Hz
with a 20 uF 440V capacitor and a 800W dimmer.

I have added a 100W light bulb in parallel as a ballast (it seems that I
burn through 5A fuses slightly less fast with this setting - is this
because with this bulb the load becomes partly resistive rather than
just inductive? ).

The Jacob's ladder works fine - but there are a couple of things I don't
understand:


-after about 20 secs of operation, the lamp gets brighter (to 100% of
power) and stays there - regardless of the setting of the dimmer (which
minimum steeing is 75 W). As if the dimmer was completely conductive.
Why is this? It comes back to "normal" after unplugging

-I get sparks from the + AND the - primary plugs (but especially from +)
to the secondary pin - it seems that these are about twice longer than
the ones between the 2 narrow parts of the jacob's ladder. Why is that?
Do I need thicker cables from the secondary to the ladder? I had to cap
everything with glue from a hot glue gun (insulating tape leaked sparks
and caught fire...) - this reduced the sparks somewhat. Any ideas about
an insulation that is less messy? I'd rather not dip the whole thing in
mineral oil - this thing is running on my kitchen table!

-After about 30 sec the whole setup stops completely... then works again
after unplugging and replugging.

-My halogen lamp plugged to the same socket shorted... is this linked to
the jacob's circuit running?

I'd like to understand this and get a stable circuit before using the
setup for a small desktop tesla coil

Many thanks for your comments

Thomas