RE: [TCML] Frying cars with Tesla coils

["James" <mustang3@xxxxxxx>]

I was running my large maggie in my workshop a few years ago at a very
reduced power. It was outputting about a 5-6' long corona. My 2001 Ford
pickup was parked about 10 feet away (also inside the workshop). As the
tuning progressed, I didn't notice how near to the truck the sparks were
getting. Then I saw a very thin spark touch the drivers mirror (as you know,
there are turn signal lamps in the mirrors). This carried the high voltage
into the trucks circuitry. I knew this was a "bad thing". This one spark
completely killed my truck. It blew the keyless entry module, dash (part of
anti-theft) and the ECM. I have all the necessary diagnostic equipment and I
troubleshot all of the bad parts. The repair parts (from a junkyard) not the
stealership, cost more than $1500. My truck also has a killer stereo in it,
thankfully it wasn't fried. Now, I always move all vehicles back to a safe
distance. In Bert's case, it's better to be lucky than good. James

-----Original Message-----
From: tesla-bounces@xxxxxxxxxx [mailto:tesla-bounces@xxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf
Of Bert Pool
Sent: Thursday, November 18, 2010 5:46 PM
To: Tesla Coil Mailing List
Subject: [TCML] Frying cars with Tesla coils

At one of my Teslathons 4 or 5 years back, Aaron Koscho and Justin Hays 
pulled their van up into the driveway where we had a large magnifier 
running.  Sparks were about 10 footers, or thereabouts.  Not only was 
the van repeatedly struck, many of the power arcs were directly to the 
radio antenna!  I was expecting them to have to push the truck 400 feet 
or so to the road after they killed all the electronics.  But not only 
did the truck's computer survive, *all* the vehicle's electronics came 
through with no problems, including the radio!  I'm talking about sparks 
that were hitting the truck and antenna and were arcing around the 
rubber tires to the concrete!  I don't remember if the truck was a Ford, 
but whatever it was, it sure was one tough truck!

Bert Pool


--------------------------------------------------

> 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 computer
>
>> failed making the car un-usable, this coincided with me running the 
>> tesla
>> coil 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, it
>> never 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 
>> the
>> cost but it wasn't as cheap.
>

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