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Re: Racing spark observations.



Original poster: "Barton B. Anderson by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>" <tesla123-at-pacbell-dot-net>

Hi Garry,

Tesla list wrote:

> Original poster: "Garry Freemyer by way of Terry Fritz
<twftesla-at-uswest-dot-net>" <Garry-at-NDFC-dot-com>
>
> Today, I had some more trouble with racing sparks. I find it difficult to
> determine the cause of the racing sparks. From what I understand, the cause
> can be any of the following three causes or a combination of the three ...
>
> 1. Mistuning.
>
> I've gotten some pretty good sparks, with racing sparks from mistuning and
> I've gotten it in tune with the same size sparks but minus the racing
> sparks.
>
> 2. Too close coupling.
>
> 3. Too much output for the size of the secondary.
>
> It seems that more often or not, by the time I figure out what is causing
> the racing sparks, the secondary is ruined and this is if I am lucky, lately
> they fry long before I get a chance to figure it out.
>
> ---
>
> Well, this time I figured it out in time. It was too close of a coupling.
>
> I figure maybe there is a pattern to the sparks that might tell us what the
> problem might be.
>
> With the too close coupling I seem to observe that the racing sparks are
> long and start from the bottom winding and travel UP the secondary and
> branch out at the end.

I've noticed the opposite. Starting at the top and running down the length
of the secondary. At
least that was my observation.

>
> With poor tuning, the racing sparks seem to be shorter, and of different
> lengths and there are multiple sparks.

I never found problems with racing sparks due to tuning. My particalar coil
has a broad tuning
point (very little change within a turn). I've never been so far our as to
get racing sparks.

>
> I also note that if the windings are too few to a point, you get the racing
> sparks, if they are too many, you just get weak output.

I found a decrease in spark length in both directions (weak output).

>
> Has anyone else noticed a pattern to the sparks like this? What would a
> spark look like if it were a result of too much voltage for the height of
> the secondary?

Interesting question. Power can be too high, but I'm not so sure about
voltage. Anyway, if power
is too much, I'd expect a burned secondary winding similar to a secondary hit.

> I figure that if we can put together a pattern, and post it somewhere, it
> might save some of us the grief of frying and torched secondaries.

That would be great. I think at least, it would be helpful to describe the
event more often,
expecially when we have concluded the cause.

Bart