Greg,
Couple of additional comments and Qs.
I am aware an IGBT switch under given circumstances should
be more efficient than a spark gap switch.
But it is not so simple.
May I ask at what frequency IGBT resistance is 0.007 ohm?
Certainly it not same at 60 Hz and 60 kHz.
And then there is some IGBT switching loss involved at
high frequencies,no?
Do you think that 0.6 ohm resistance of the spark is a constant
value during the transfer of energy from primary to secondary
(first notch primary ringdown)?
If yes why,if not what 0.6 ohm represents then?
I found an interesting design of IGBT coil here:
http://scopeboy.com/tesla/t4spec.html
I calculated primary Zchar and it turns out to be only
about 0.09 ohm.
This coil at 4 kW puts out 81 inches sparks.
According to Freau empirical formula it should perform
with sparks over 100 inches long.In your opinion what
is more important for underperformance here :400 BPS or
very low primary impedance and increased primary losses?
Note that this coil also quenches at first notch.
Dex
--- lod@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
From: Greg Leyh <lod@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: tesla@xxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [TCML] Re: Solid state efficiency, was: mini Tesla coil specs
Date: Sun, 15 Nov 2009 12:11:43 -0800
Hi Dex,
100BPS would probably produce longer arcs at constant wattage since Epri
would necessarily be higher. However, the optimum BPS at constant power
would likely be somewhere 100 and 350BPS.
At normal TC primary operating currents, the IGBTs I used have a much
lower R_effective than the 120L rotary gap. The IGBTs exhibit about
0.007Ohm where the SGTC is about 0.6Ohm.
Expressed as a ratio against Zpri however, the difference is somewhat
less. The ratio for the SS primary would be 0.75/0.007 = 107, where the
ratio for the SGTC system is 14/0.6 = 23. So one could say that the SS
switch is about 4.5 times better than the SG switch.
But again, the SS switch comes at a cost, both in terms of the IGBTs
themselves, the control circuitry, and the specialized coppersmithing
required for the primary circuit. GL