More on strange behavior

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Original poster: "J. B. Weazle McCreath by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <weazle-at-hurontel.on.ca>


Justin, Malcolm, & Coilers,

Several of you have suggested a carbon track on the secondary form.
I'll check for that, but I hope that I don't find anything of that
sort, as I took great pains when building the coil to avoid it.

There are three baffles inside the form, well sealed with solvent
and then silicone.  I also purged the interior of the form with
nitrogen before sealing the end caps on.  Neither end of the
winding goes inside the form at any place.

As to the sound of the gap...it does change when the streamers stop,
I think, but the streamers are so noisy I don't normally hear the
gap at all.  When the streamers stop, the gap has a sizzle sound
to it, but I don't know what it sounds like when all is OK.

My air flow through the gap is conciderable, as I'm using a vacuum
cleaner unit mounted atop the housing of the gap, so I doubt it's
a quenching problem either, but as some suggested, it may be heat
in the gap that's my problem.  I'm going to remove the gap and do
a thorough inspection and cleaning of it and try again.

Thanks to all those who offered suggestions.


73, Weazle, VE3EAR/VE3WZL

Listening: 147.030+ and 442.075+
E-mail:    weazle-at-hurontel.on.ca
           or ve3ear-at-rac.ca
Web site:  www.hurontel.on.ca/~weazle