Re: [TCML] valve coil problems

[<lightningfor@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Yes, thats pretty much whats happenning here. (also yes, standard positive
feed back, self oscillator)
But somehow the secondary coil is taking over control of the valve. I have
not seen this happen before...
The tuned circuit in the plate (even when designed to have a high Q) , or
in the grid, is having very little sway over the driving frequency.
The valve I am using is a Tetrode 4CX15000A. It can dissapate 15kw, and is
good for 50kw in class C.

The screen is well bypassed, and the cathode is well bypassed. the only
thing that I can think of is that the ground cable is fairly long, and
could be getting a voltage on it from the secondary base driving into it.
However, The secondary, cathode, and grid etc, are all grounded to a large
aluminium ground plane, so am I correct in saying that even if the ground
cable that earths this plate had a voltage accross it, as long as the
components are all seeing the same potential at the same time, then the
voltage should not effect the valve.
In other words, it is the difference in voltage between cathode and grid
that is important right?

So:
How is the secondary triggering the valve?
Why the third harmonic and not the resonant frequency?
How do I test to solve this?

Kind regards,

Carlos

On Tue, 01 Nov 2011 07:58:57 -0700, Carl Noggle <cn@xxxxx> wrote:
> Hi, Carlos,
> 
> If you are running it as a self-oscillator, it could be that the 
> secondary is resonating as a 3/4 wave--I had a TC that did that once.  
> If you can, I would advocate driving your final valves from a 
> driver--better control and better efficiency.  What kind of monster 
> valves are you using?
> 
> ---Carl
> 
> 
> 
>> Hi People,
>> I am in the final stages of my giant valve coil (50kw).
>> I have changed the circuit that I am using since the first time I fired
>> it
>> up, in an effort to get longer arcs.
>> To cut a long story short, I have a peculiar tuning problem.
>> I measure the secondary resonant frequency, then Tune the tank to
match,
>> then run the oscillator with no secondary and make sure it is
oscillating
>> correctly, then slowly introduce the secondary inch by inch.
>> Even with a very loosely coupled coil, as soon as the tank sees the
>> secondary, the valve starts to oscillate at about the 3rd harmonic of
the
>> secondary coil...
>>
>> To put this problem into perspective, I have built many valve coils,
and
>> never had this problem.
>> The coil was built over a year ago, but has sat around for almost a
year
>> since its first tests and admittedly suffered some water damage to the
>> valve cabinet.
>> Over the last week, I have tried 3 different secondarys each with a
>> different frequency, different coupling factors, circuits with the tank
>> in
>> the plate, and circuits with tank in the grid...
>> But for some weird reason, every one of them gets swamped by the
>> secondary
>> coil, and runs at the 3rd harmonic.
>>
>> Any Ideas as to what could be going on?
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Carlos
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