Re: 6" Coil Problems

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

Original poster: "by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <Kidd6488-at-aol-dot-com>

Hello, 
       That is great advice, but here is how I set the Safety Gaps:

With the wiring: NST, Terry filter in paralell, power resistors in series, then
safety gaps.

1) Connect only Nst, Filter and Safety gaps.
2) Adjust gaps, one by one, until they just still fire. Open them up a little
farther (a little farther, is less than a quarter turn, with I believe standard
22 thread/in bolts)

They had to have been set even conservatively narrow, because occasionally, the
surge of the NST starting would cause them to fire. I would turn it off then on
again, and nothing.

I do not know how long that solder (I guess I've been spelling it wrong :-) )
has been in there, nor were it came from. I plan on running the entire coil in
a few hours, with no filter. Just power resistors and safety gaps.

Does that setup sound OK? Am I risking a NST's life (no name for him)? Maybe I
should try resetting the safety gaps, just in case....

Thanks so far,

---------------------------------------
Jonathon Reinhart
hot-streamer-dot-com/jonathon

>
> Original poster: "Ted Rosenberg by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>"
> <Ted.Rosenberg-at-radioshack-dot-com>
>
> Jonathan:
> I recently went through a similar experience which I related last week in a
> post entitled Setting the Safety Gap.
> If your safety gap on the Terry Filter is too wide and it never fires, any
> over volting by the NST due to a wide main spark gap could backfire and
> overheat the MOV array to the point that the solder on their leads melts!
> And, of course, if one MOV goes, they all do.
> I cleaned off the filter board, reset the SG according to the step-by-step
> info in the archives, replaced the MOV string and all is well once more.
> My main gap, a t-gap, is set differently, of course, than a static gap.
> When I had a static gap, the total "gappage" of the 9 tubes was about .0312
> or so. As I recall, the total of all the gaps was .25 and .25 divided by 8
> was .03125 And that was with a 15/60ma NST.
> Hope this helps.
> Safety first
>
> Ted
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Tesla list [mailto:tesla-at-pupman-dot-com]
> Sent: Monday, September 23, 2002 11:28 PM
> To: tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
> Subject: 6" Coil Problems
>
>
> Original poster: "by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>"
> <Kidd6488-at-aol-dot-com>
>
> Hello everyone,  (forgive me for this being long, there is a lot to include 
> :-\   .)
>       
>        I've had my coil put away for a while, and recently brought it out
> for 
> some tests. 
>        If you don't know, my coil is as follows:
>
> - 12/60 NST
> - Terry Filter
> - Multi - Pipe Static Spark Gap   ( 12 gaps, each at .025" )
> - .017 uF Geek Cap
> - 10 turn, .25" Cu pipe primary coil
> - 6" * 30" (Wound) secondary coil, #20 AWG wire.
> - Controller consists of just a switch/light combo, and one outlet.