Biggg coil's opening night

["Kevin R Eldredge" <kreld-at-juno-dot-com> (by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>)]

All

  At last the Biggg coil was assembled today & first firing was around
dusk.  The 2' x 10' secondary with 7' dia toroid, stands 12' above
ground.  Performance is not up to snuff yet.  I'm having problems with
the voltage/current relationship with the high voltage transformer.  I've
only been able to get 150 volts into the primary at over 100 amps.  A
large range of inductive ballasting was used.  More time tommorow to play
with it.

 Max spark has been 14' to a ladder and the spark was not played out,
quite heavy in current.
Also, I'm having 4 to 5 disscharges at all times regardless of coupling
and a breakout rod hung off the toroid, bigger toroid needed.

  Good news on the 480 break sync rotary.  The stationary electrodes are
3/8" tungsten and the rotating electrodes are 1/2" steel rollers from a
large roller bearing.  It was thought that tungsten would be needed to
replace these after tuning it up, but so far so good.

Some people were wanting to see it fire when done, I have not forgotten,
I just want the coil performing up to par for its public unleashing.

Some of the specs of the coil are as follows:

Secondary wound with 6000 feet of #14 T.H.H.N. on an open wood & P.V.C.
frame
Inductance 96 mH with 15 ohm dc resistance.  Weighs over 200 LB

Primary coil 9 turns 5/8" copper tube tapped at 6 turns

0.173 uF 80 kV Maxwell cap

H.V. transformer 23,000 volt -at-15 kVA

2 H.P. sync rotory 480 break

Coiling in Oklahoma

Kevin E.