RE: triggered spark gap in a vacuum?

["Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>]

Original poster: "sundog by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>" <sundog-at-timeship-dot-net>

Hi All!

 Thanks to you all :)  I did some digging on my own and came up with about
the same answers.

 The planned trigatron will be made of aluminum structural tubing, 3" OD and
2 1/4" ID, giving me a 3/8 wall.  The end plates will be 1/2" thick
aluminum, and 1" thick polycarbonate (I can get 2" also).  The real task
will be sealing it up well enough to withstand the alternate vacuum and
explosive pressure differences.  The only real places I can forsee xrays
being able to escape the container is the polycarbonate endcap, and the
holes for pumping it down and backfilling it.  But the "soft" radiation it
would put off shouldn't go further than 1/3 the distance of the "10 foot
pole" I'll be away from it.  I'm wary of the polycarbonate disc at the end
(even though it's 1" thick).  The metal parts of the container I'm sure will
stand up to the pressure (I intend to put hefty valves on the pump/fill
fittings so I don't get a "hiccup" of high pressure blasting through the
pump.)  Construction won't start for a while yet (still recovering from my
bout of the flu, leaves ya weak.)

 But I now know better what I'm gettin' into, and how to keep safe.  Now, to
find those elusive pulse caps that aren't across the US, but in the
Southeast corner of the US.

  												Shad


-----Original Message-----
From: Tesla list [mailto:tesla-at-pupman-dot-com]
Sent: Monday, January 22, 2001 10:49 PM
To: tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
Subject: Re: triggered spark gap in a vacuum?


Original poster: "by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>"
<Mddeming-at-aol-dot-com>



Tesla list wrote:
>
> Original poster: "sundog by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>"
<sundog-at-timeship-dot-net>
>
>  Hi all!
snip---
>
>   I don't like the idea of irraidating myself, nor having to explain to
the
> others in my house exactly *why* a spark gap has to be wrapped in lead
> blankets :/  The idea of growing any more toes isn't too hot either ;)
I'm
> not paranoid about getting a dose of x-rays, but want to be informed as to
> what I'm tinkering with.

I went to the sources, "Lecture Brfore the New York Academy of Sciences-
April 6, 1987" N. Tesla, " The Fundamentals of X-Ray and Radium Physics" 4th
ed. (1967) by J. Selman, MD, and D.A.Rinehart's "Roentgenographic
Technique",(1943) . All seem to concur that Aluminum foil or mesh as little
as 1 mm thick and a few centimeters of free air space should provide
adequate
shielding for soft X-rays (below 35 kV). A way to verify this might be to
place a few pieces of photographic film in opaque, thin plastic or cardboard
containers at about 6" - 12" from your Al foil-shielded gap, run it for
several minutes from a distance, and develop the film. A blank film means no
problem, an exposed film means oops.

Matt D.