I absolutely have no reason to doubt that EMP can wreck a car's computer or computers. The computer modules in the vehicles I own are in plastic cases and have various signal and power busses emanating from them. Obviously, a pulse could generate a spike on any of those lines, and all you'd have to do is jiggle the bits in the PROM that controls things like the engine timing, and the car is going nowhere. Not to mention you could fry the interface on any device on any module, and things would be bad.
And someone on this list posted a link to a video of a proposed car-stopping EMP weapon. Clearly these things exist. Clearly, EMP from our coils can stop our cars as we have witnessed.
As for me, I now park my cars in the street when I run my coil - both to barricade my driveway, and to keep the cars out of range.
In contrast, though, I note without any desire to repeat the event that I have personally been a passenger in more than one flying aircraft that has been hit by lightning. And I have pals who were in automobiles that were struck by lighting during storms on the east coast. In all cases, thank ye gods, the vehicles continued to move without incident and no injuries were sustained.
Also, I have unintentionally zapped both of my vehicles with strikes from my coil. The result was that the vehicle built up a static charge which unloaded through me when I touched it.
So empirically I can deduce that the alternating EM fields that come from a running coil, or EMP generated by something coil-wise, is a more powerful current-inducing mechanism than arc strikes. Or it's somehow more directable around the vehicle's "faraday cage" -- presuming it has a conducting body. (I would probably not zap my old Corvette with a coil...though the wife made me sell it, so it's a non issue.)
It's an interesting phenomenon.And you won't soon catch me running my coil around any vehicle I would like to keep running.
Joe On 11/17/2010 4:56 PM, Peter Terren wrote:
That's why in my car shots I used a hire car with extra insurance.http://tesladownunder.com/Tesladownunder%20Car%20Theft%20Protection%201000.jpgMore recently I have obtained a $100 car from the wreckers so I can be more destructive with lightning simulations with exploding wires.http://tesladownunder.com/JunkCarOrangeBolt10kJ.jpg Peter -------------------------------------------------- From: "Steve Ward" <steve.ward@xxxxxxxxx> Sent: Wednesday, November 17, 2010 11:13 PM To: "Tesla Coil Mailing List" <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx> Subject: Re: [TCML] Fried It ! .....On the 1996 ford taurus, something in the computerfailed making the car un-usable, this coincided with me running the teslacoil in the garage. That is, after running the coil near the car, the computer was trashed (first and last time i would ever do that). No, itnever arced to the car, and i'd estimate the car was maybe 8-10 feet away from the coil itself. The computer had to be replaced, i dont recall thecost but it wasn't as cheap......> SteveOn Tue, Nov 9, 2010 at 5:07 PM, Brandon Garretson <garretsontech@xxxxxxxxx>wrote:I personally would not run my coil that close to a modern motor vehicle either. Call me paranoid but there are numerous electronic devices that could be damaged by EMPs._______________________________________________ Tesla mailing list Tesla@xxxxxxxxxx http://www.pupman.com/mailman/listinfo/tesla
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