[TCML] Re: The current recordholders?

[Greg Leyh]

Hi Jeff,

Sorry for the confusion, that was my poor attempt at humor.  I’ve no 
plans to do any of those things to the experimental coil.  I was just 
trying to stress that power is not a useful metric, anymore than a 
coil’s weight, or its cost.

Regarding the 60ft, 78ft and 120ft arc length claims listed below, 
there’s not much that I could add;  I honestly don’t know where such 
numbers come from.  Personally, I’ve never seen Electrum produce more 
than 30-40ft discharges.  I can offer a photo of Electrum producing 
discharges about 30ft in length:

http://www.lightninglab.org/misc/ElectrumArcMsmt.jpg

For scale, I placed a 6ft person in the sphere, which is about 7ft in 
diameter.  The longest discharge in the photo is about 5 people, or 30ft 
in length.  When the wind comes from the harbor, the arcs occasionally 
strike the steep hill behind Electrum, connecting to a cluster of 
shrubbery there that becomes quite aromatic when struck.  We measured 
the straight-line distance to the shrubbery at about 38ft.

The above photo was shot in July 2008 by Alistair Keddie and Stuart Page 
of Big Alba Photography.  The full photo can be viewed here:

http://my-expressions.com/up_media/2764/pblog/2817/1218834965.jpg

Along with most folks here I’d like to see photos of 120ft, 78ft or even 
55ft arcs, produced by any type of machine.  There's reason to hope we 
might still see such arcs, within the next ten years.

-GL


----- Original Message -----
From: "Jeff W. Parisse" <workshop at xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
 > Greg,
 >
 > Your upgrade plan sounds counterproductive. Perhaps you can offer
 > a constructive statement as to the maximum arc length reached by
 > Electrum. I understand that arc length is not the only measurement
 > of a Tesla coil's operational characteristics but it seems to serve
 > as a starting point for peer review.
 >
 > Jeff
 >
 >
 >> ----- Original Message -----
 >> From: "Greg Leyh" <lod at xxxxxxxxxxx>
 >> Currently, I'm planning a major power upgrade to the existing 120L50K
 >> experimental coil shown here:
 >> http://www.lightninglab.org/Projects/120L50K/120L50K.html
 >>
 >> The plan is as follows:
 >> A) Replace the 3-phase DC resonant charger with a single-phase xfmr
 >> using resistive ballasts.
 >>
 >> B) Change out the pulse caps in the primary for high-ESR filter caps.
 >>
 >> C) Add lossy magnetic core material around the primary conductors.
 >>
 >> D) Decrease the bleed resistor value to 2500ohm, on the 26kV line.
 >>
 >> E) Increase the rotary gap break rate to 900 BPS.
 >>
 >> After these changes the power draw should increase to well over 300
 >> kilowatts, making this the most powerful coil in the world. The arc
 >> length performance shouldn't be noticably affected.
 >>
 >>  -GL
 >>>
 >>>
 >>> In a message dated 5/14/2009 5:37:35 A.M. Mountain Daylight Time,
 >>> resonance at xxxxxxxxxxxx writes:
 >>>
 >>> The  Electrum coil was producing 55 to 60 ft long sparks at 130 kVA.
 >>>
 >>> I have a large one in Australia, running at 150 kVA, class RSG type,
 >>> 8 ft dia x 42 ft tall, produces 78 ft sparks.
 >>>
 >>> Jeff P.'s large coil I think runs at  200 kVA and produces 120 ft
 >>> long sparks (the China coil). I don't know if they set it up and
 >>> tested it prior to shipping or not.
 >>>
 >>> Dr.  Resonance