Re: space winding

[Tesla729-at-cs-dot-com (by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>)]

In a message dated 8/8/00 11:52:45 AM Pacific Daylight Time, tesla-at-pupman-dot-com 
writes:

<< What I found was that a closewind with 
 heavier gauge wire just costs more in wire because any benefit 
 the heavier gauge gives is knocked flat by the proximity 
 effect when the turns are in closest proximity to one another. >>
 
Malcolm, John F,

Well, I guess the verdict is in, then. Both of you
have pretty much answered with almost identical comments 
about the "proximity effect" of minimal spacing of windings. I
am a little confused though, as my present largest coil system,
"Medusa" has a close-wound sec coil and its performance, to
me at least, is outstanding. I have had to get a few bugs out
of the system as far as turn/turn flashovers, but now it produces
down right frightening discharges with my 10 KVA pole pig pow-
er source with no problems. It's sec is close-wound with #16
double-coated magnet wire and the sec dimensions are 12" dia
x 38" long ( ~665 turns). With an 8" x 32" toroid top load, I get 8
to 10 ft. sparks in a claustrophobic (hope I spelled that right) 12'
x 20' shop -at- 7 to 8 KVA. If I run it maxed out, (around 11 KVA) 
the sparks don't have room to grow in length, they just get bright-
er, fatter, and louder. Of course, I DO use a rotory spark gap and
a 0.0825 uFD tank capacitor. Anyway, this is the best perform-
ance that I have ever obtained to date and I'm already quite cramped
for space by the sparks that I have now, so until I can get into larger
facilities, I won't be trying to get any bigger with my sparks. I forgot
to mention that the primary coil's L is ~32 uH. I won't go into any
more detail of my system right now as the turn/turn spacing was
the issue -at- hand.

I'm not good at the technical aspects of coiling, I'm just going by what
I have seen. And I'll admit that max efficiency has not been a top priority
in my coil designs, just to get the biggest sparks that I possibly could
by hook or crook. I'll bet there's a few other coilers like that. too.
Please, Malclom, John, or any other knowledgable person  on the list,  
feel free to further comment on this thread, as I want to learn all that
I can regarding this.

David R.