Resistive Ballast Success

• To: tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
• Subject: Resistive Ballast Success
• From: "Barton B. Anderson" <mopar-at-uswest-dot-net> (by way of Terry Fritz <terryf-at-verinet-dot-com>)
• Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 20:33:20 -0700
• Approved: terryf-at-verinet-dot-com

DC, all,
In the other post (Wood), I made reference to adding
resistive ballast to my variac ballast to stop the
continuous SG firing I was getting after the stationary
electrode placement on to the delrin block on the rsg.

Well, tonight I did this and the SG didn't fire once. I
can now adjust the SG to a closer distance (possibly). I
didn't pull full power tonight, but I did run it at half
power. Last night at about 1/4 power, the SG fired
almost continuously. Major difference tonight!

I had a 3.5" x 20" 10 ohm resistor (really big). I
basically don't need the 10 ohm and decided to cut it
(resistive winding) and effectively center tap it. I
used a large hose clamp to keep the resistive winding in
the center in tact and connected the two ends. From
center tap to one end of the resistor measured 2.1 ohms
with plenty of watt capabilities (barely got warm). I
hooked the resistor in series with the variac inductor.
Kind of nice to have a high watt resistor to manipulate
(2.1, 5, or 10 ohms available now).

Conclusion:
I previously settled for the SG firing far more often
than it should have (the wood in the gap was probably
acting a little resistive and allowed me to be
"mislead"). I don't think I'll ever run a variac without
a little resistance to quiet things down (electrically
and audibly).

Bart (really slow sometimes)

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