RE: water as spark gap dielectric

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

Original poster: "Jim Lux by way of Terry Fritz <teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>" <jimlux-at-earthlink-dot-net>

At 11:12 AM 4/17/2003 -0600, you wrote:
>Original poster: "Lau, Gary by way of Terry Fritz <teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>" 
><Gary.Lau-at-hp-dot-com>
>
>Intriguing, but my understanding of using DI water as a dielectric is that 
>the duration of the pulse must be brief, or else the water will break 
>down.  In a TC gap, the gap voltage ramps from zero to the breakdown value 
>at a lazy 60 Hz rate.  Does my understanding require revision?  I hope so, 
>this sounds like a great way to improve gap efficiency!
>
>Gary Lau
>MA, USA


The water does breakdown a bit from electrolysis, but if it's sufficiently 
pure, the breakdown is negligible (they use DI water as a coolant on HV 
vacuum tubes, for instance).