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RE: Newspaper Aluminum Sheets



Have you actually used this capacitor in Tesla Coil service?

Brian Basura




-----Original Message-----
From: Tesla List [mailto:tesla-at-pupman-dot-com]
Sent: Wednesday, September 29, 1999 4:38 PM
To: tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
Subject: Re: Newspaper Aluminum Sheets


Original Poster: "The Flavored Coffee Guy" <elgersmad-at-msn-dot-com> 


Shoot, man, I made a wooden box with one crank on a dowel, and four dowels
for holding foil, or generic wax paper.  This is how I had spacers set up to
make a capacitor on the rack that held only the four dowels for dispensing.

 |||-------------|    1
 ||-------------||    2
 |-------------|||    3
 ||-------------||    4
-|--------------|-|~    5

1.    Is foil.
2.    Is Waxpaper.
3.    Is foil.
4.    Is Waxpaper.
5.    Is the Crank.


    All of the foil, and waxpaper were equally long roles in inches, and
where the foil went past the waxpaper was used at the ends for electrical
contact.

    Now, my take up reel, or crank was centered like the waxpaper but, as
much wider as the overlap of the aluminum foil, and with a 1/4 inch on
either side it ain't bad.  The thing that I needed was a 6th roller U bolted
to a couple of rat traps for spring to keep the role flat on the take up
reel with the crank.

   /-----------/
-|-------------|-|~

    I found that rubbing the layers can help square them when you start
cranking but, at then turn that thing down tight because, the closer the two
capacitor plates are and the less air there is between them, the high the
value of capacitance.  I suppose that you could use springs your own way, or
buy a kit filled with all sorts of springs from your local mega hardware
store because, I have see those bulk.  Then two door hinges for the spring
loaded pinch roller that keeps you take up reel tight.

    The more exact you are at measuring wood, and the better you are at
making this to the exact measurements of the rolls of aluminum, and
waxpaper, or possibly a adjustable stock for the length of rolls on this
thing, the better it works.  Mine was all wood and screws, sand coat, hard
coat, gloss coat, and sanded with 3 desending grades of sand paper from 60,
100, 200,  then the sand coat, 400 wet and dry, hard coat then sanded it
with 600 grit, then the glossy coat.  It looked like a piece of furniture
for making two ply paper towels into 8 ply super towels.  But, the shinny
surface allows for some slippage, and provides a fairly constant, and equal
level of friction on each role.  Leave the dowel with the crank on it, in
the middle of finished role, and cut off the ends with the handle, and the
extended part of the rollers pin that was used to allow it to rotate.    I
used 1 inch diameter dowels, which are just about twice as big around as
broomsticks.  I used 1X1s as a screw base to hold my corners together as a
frame for the half inch plywood.  The edges were left fairly rough but, I
painted em' anyway.  At all of the friction points that count, use only a
sanding block to keep everything as square as possible.

James.




>Original Poster: Clifford D Fahrer <cfahrer-at-in-touch-dot-net>
>
>Has anyone used the thin aluminum sheets that newspapers use for page
>print for flat plate capacitors.  The newspaper people dispose of the
>sheets when they get old.  The sheets are the size of a sheet of
>newspaper and ,(I think), are anodized where the print appears. I don't
>know if this newsprint process changes the surface properties of the
>sheets.
>
>If I can't get any answers from the list I will get a sheet and test.
>They are FREE and seem to be the right size for flat plate capacitors.
>
>Coiling in SW Ohio------Cliff
>
>