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Any Coilers in Adelaide or Melbourne Australia on this
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From: Malcolm Watts [SMTP:MALCOLM-at-directorate.wnp.ac.nz]
Sent: Tuesday, March 17, 1998 2:38 PM
To: Tesla List
Subject: Re: Any Coilers in Adelaide or Melbourne Australia on this
Hi Matt,
> From: Matthew Mills [SMTP:mattmills-at-mindless-dot-com]
> Sent: Monday, March 16, 1998 8:29 PM
> To: Tesla List
> Subject: Any Coilers in Adelaide or Melbourne Australia on this list?
>
> Hi I am moving to Adelaide soon and would like to be able to get in
> contact with someone who lives close to Adelaide who is interested in
> Tesla coiling. It is such a lonely hobby when I am the only Tesla
> coiler I have met. Plus maybe if I could prove to my wife that I'm not
> the only fool who plays around with HV electricity she might understand
> my hobby a little bit better or at least accept it!!!
> It would be great to get together.
>
> Also do people know how easy it is to find materials for tesla coils in
> Australia? In New Zealand I have had such a hard time finding parts.
> Neons are non-existant second hand and new ones cost $250. Pole pigs
> are impossible to get. Capacitors are out of the question as Aluminium
> foil is no longer made in New Zealand (I went to Ulrich aluminium) and
> Polyethylene sheet is outrageously expensive. Commercial ones are a
> dream. Ferrite chokes cant be found and Variacs well the 5A ones are
> $900 so I would hate to hazard a guess as to the price of a 30A one (BTW
> I saw a 240V 44A variac for sale on the net for $130US WOW!!!) but at
> 75lbs it would cost more to ship than a car!
> 10 inch pvc pipes are $300 and the end caps for 8 inch pvc are $90
> each!!
>
> Well Im beyond hacked off.....Im fuming this is so frustrating..I just
> hope Aussie treats my hobby better.
>
> Matt.
Understand your frustrations. I've visited local neon sign firms and
got an intermittent dialogue with one who gives me the odd
transformer from time to time. At a time when I needed several, he
had none but suggested another outfit with whom I negotiated to buy
three second hand 15kV 60mA units for about $80 each. I may look at
getting someone in the States to purchase a pole pig and ship it over.
I have been talking with a rep from a shipping company and apparently
they are more concerned about volume than weight. On the face of it
the exercise does not sound all that expensive.
I use Al foil from a local supermarket to make poly caps. You can
readily buy 50m rolls of 2m wide poly in both 0.125 and 0.25 mm
thicknesses from hardware outlets. The trick is to get stuff that
isn't peppered with defects (mainly gritty type bumps). They are
pretty helpful if you strike up a rapport. My last roll of 0.125mm
cost me $138.
I've just about moved away from using chokes altogether. If I
really think they are ncessary, I wind them on old solder bobbins.
Commercial caps - I purchased mine from the States. Only way.
There is a firm in Rotorua called Metallec Industries that manufacture
polyprop PFC capacitors. They might possibly be able to make extended
foil caps to spec. I have no idea what they would charge. It might
not be viable for them due to machine setup but.....
Malcolm