Re: Plane wave antenna making

["Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>]

Original poster: "Charles T. Pike by way of Terry Fritz <teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>" <ctpike-at-rcn-dot-com>

Terry,

How do you calibrate your voltage measurements?

Charlie

Tesla list wrote:
 >
 > Original poster: "Terry Fritz" <teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>
 >
 > Hi All,
 >
 > I am going to loan my plane antenna to DC for awhile:
 >
 > http://hot-streamer-dot-com/TeslaCoils/MyPapers/planant/waveant3.html
 >
 > The most obnoxious part about making these is the etching of the grid 
pattern:
 >
 > http://hot-streamer-dot-com/TeslaCoils/MyPapers/planant/Image133.jpg
 >
 > http://hot-streamer-dot-com/TeslaCoils/MyPapers/planant/Image136.jpg
 >
 > So I thought this would be a good time to try it with a solid plane
 > instead.  So I whipped one up:
 >
 > http://hot-streamer-dot-com/temp/030601-01.jpg
 >
 > it seems to work fine:
 >
 > http://hot-streamer-dot-com/temp/030601-02.gif
 >
 > The wave form is still very true without any problems.  I was originally
 > worried about eddy currents and such floating around in a solid plane, but
 > it does not seem to mater.  One "could" put a few simple slits in it too I
 > guess...
 >
 > In this case, I am just driving a toroid with a signal generator and the
 > attenuation is 5000:1 at 5 inches.  Of course, for a real operating coil
 > that distance might be 15 to 20 feet so the attenuation might be more like
 > 100000:1.
 >
 > So if one wants to make one of these and you can't etch the nice pattern
 > easily, just leave it solid.
 >
 > I also fine I hardly ever use the current sensing side for anything.  Just
 > making the simple voltage side probably covers 99% of the uses.  It is also
 > best to use very small leaded resistors and capacitors for the
 > antenna.  Trying to solder those delicate surface mount components to try
 > and squeeze out better performance is a real pain and probably not needed.
 >
 > Cheers,
 >
 >         Terry