RE: Vortex gap loss measurements

["Lau, Gary" <Gary.Lau-at-compaq-dot-com> (by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>)]

>Original poster: FutureT-at-aol-dot-com 
>
>Gary,
>
>Nice experiments.  It's good to see a measurement for that.  Now
>it will be interesting to see if it translates into visibly longer sparks.

Unfortunately that's going to be a problem - my garage walls and ceiling are
now the limiting factors in how long a spark I can make.

>Then there's the question of the sync gap and what it's comparative
>capabilities may be in further tests.  (I know that so far your sync
>gap sparks were shorter than the air blast static gap sparks.)

I'm not ready to conclude that my sync RSG wasn't as good, I probably need
to play around more with the phase and who knows what else, but there's just
so many things...

>I would think that your voltex gap might quench a little better than
>the vacuum gap too, since I think pressure helps quenching besides
>reducing losses.  Interesting too about the variable bang size and
>variable voltage gap breakdown in the static gap....

I just thought of something.  The scope triggered on the rising edge of the
ringdown.  If the cap was charged in one polarity, the scope will trigger on
the first cycle.  The other 50% of the time when the cap is charged in the
other polarity, it won't trigger until one (decremented) cycle later.  This
may explain it!  I wish I could think of a way to always trigger on the
first ringdown edge.

>The sync gap
>has two series gaps.... is this hurting it's performance because of
>more losses.... who knows?  Or is the
>variable bps of the sync gap (120 bps average) helping matters?

(static gap?)  I doubt that variable BPS can be better than a constant
presumably near-optimal BPS.

>Or is the possibly better quenching of the vortex static gap
>helping vs. the sync rotary?   Tests will tell.
>
>John Freau

Regards, Gary Lau
Waltham, MA USA