Re: [TCML] Running at 15/120

["David Rieben" <drieben@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Joe,

Sounds like you're aquiring quite an "NST farm" in your never-
ending quest for ever longer sparks ;^) You may have reached
the point that you just need to break down and get yourself a
pole pig. I've been down the same path you have and trust me,
one decent 10 kVA pole pig will plainly blow the doors off of
any PRACTICAL arrangement of NSTs. I speak from exper-
iance, as I had gone all the way up to (10) 15/30s in parallel-
that's 15 kV @ 300 mA! Of course, the only draw back with
pole pig driving of your coil is that your transformer will require
external ballasting. Still, if you're looking for sparks that are 10
ft.+ and very bright, which means more current, then a pole
distribution transfromer is the way to go as a HV power source
for SG driven Tesla coil systems. Of course, you would need to
upgrade the components of the rest of your coil to accomidate
the increased power throughput, too.

Since you've already fried your garage door opener (been there,
done that and have the matching Tee-shirt and ball cap :^), you
are either going to have to upgrade your facilities or move your
active coil to a safe distance from your shop outdoors (the much
cheaper solution) if you wish to keep making bigger sparks ;^)
I run my pole pig driven "Green Monster" about 35 ft. outside my
garage door opening on my driveway and I do not have any elec-
tonic interferance problems from it, with the exception of the elec-
tronic ballasted florescent ligths in my shop - it does make them
flicker pretty badly when they are left on. No more garage door
opener casualties, alarm system going haywire, computer acting
crazy, ect. since moving my operations outside the house, though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3pfStBx2qY

Of course, I do have a good dedicated RF ground system that I
installed right at the border of the drive way and the yard and the
coil is ran right beside the RF ground and connected via a 5-6 ft.
lenght of heavy braided, tinned copper cable.

David Rieben



----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Joe Mastroianni" <joe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: "Tesla Coil Mailing List" <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, August 14, 2010 12:35 PM
Subject: [TCML] Running at 15/120



Running JavaTC, upgrading from 15/90 to 15/120 went according to the 
numbers.  Everything predictable and smooth.
I have increased the tank cap from 0.041uF to 0.058uF and retuned to 6 turns 
from 7.  JavaTC suggests the right tuning is 5.7  turns, I'm guessing the 
difference of  6% is well within tolerance.

Now that the cap is "right" and the tuning is "right", the  SRSG now fires 
with the exact same settings as it did at 15/90.   No safety gaps firing 
though still only at 2/3 max on the variac due to running inside the garage. 
(Figure the garage door opener is already toasted, may as well not worry 
about it.)   No Racing sparks.  No arcing from the primary to the secondary.

Have to get a better camera to capture the streamers.

Will move to 15/150 later and a full power run in the driveway.

Cheers,
Joe


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