jhowson4@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
hey I was wondering if it was possible to make a voltage divider capable to measuring the voltage from a medium sized tesla coil...with resistors from say radio shack. i found some information online and everyone seemes to be using about 10 of those huge high power resistors. What if I used like a hundred normal resistors? since i can buy alot for really cheap from a friend.
Tough to do..You're measuring hundreds of kV. A 2 Watt resistor can work to about 1kV, so you could string up a couple hundred resistors. Then, you need to pick a value. It needs to be pretty high, say, 100Meg (so, with 1kV, the current is 10 uA, and it won't dissipate too much power.. 10mW, each). If you use the little 1/4W resistors, you probably need 5-10 times as many in the string.
But.. the real problem is that you're measuring an RF signal at a few hundred kHz. The parasitic C and L of that big string of resistors will dominate the resistive component.
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