Re: high coupling -> racing sparks was Re: horizontal half wave(double ended) coil

["Tesla list" <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Original poster: Bert Hickman <bert.hickman@xxxxxxxxxx>

Tesla list wrote:
> Original poster: Terry Fritz <teslalist@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Hi Paul,
> At 06:23 AM 3/27/2005, you wrote:
>
> > But, nobody is studying these things. Perhaps the new generation of
> > solid stage systems will offer the precise control necessary for
> > such work. -- Paul Nicholson --
>
> My DRSSTC is computer controlled :-))))
> Last night I wrote a little program to do:
> 1 cycle, wait 1 sec, 2 cycles, wait 1 sec, 3 cycles, wait on sec.....
>  to 30 cycles...
> I can vary the power at will and the "BPS" from 40 Hz to ~250 Hz...
> The firing cycle pulse width can be varied (on the fly) from 10uS to
>  500uS...
> Specs (slightly out of date due to new top terminal and protection 
> chokes.  ~103kHz now) are at:
> http://drsstc.com/~terrell/notes/DRSSTCspecifications.pdf
> http://drsstc.com/~terrell/
> I am all ears if you know something fun to test!!
> Cheers,
> Terry

Terry,

Hmm.. this sounds like a great approach for getting a better handle on 
macroscopic spark propagation characteristics/parameters. While we already 
know that spark growth occurs from bang to bang, the precise control of 
your setup could also allow us to determine whether spark growth also 
occurs from one RF cycle to the next during ringup. By using a 1 sec wait 
time (or longer), the vestiges of the previous discharge should virtually 
be gone.

Some possibilities:
Using a breakout ball of known diameter, slowly increment the number of 
ringup cycles looking for initial breakout. Then slowly increment the 
number of ringup cycles to see whether the average discharge length 
continues to increase with an increasing number of ringup cycles.

If so, does the incremental spark length increase follow a x*Sqrt(Pwr) law?

If spark loading begins to "clamp" resonator output during ringup, does the 
clamping action also reduce/prevent further incremental spark growth?

Does the above behavior change as the rate of energy transfer (per cycle) 
is varied (is it possible to easily change the rail voltages on the driver 
for these tests)?

Is there an optimal rate for resonator ringup in order to see maximum 
incremental spark growth?

Lots of interesting possibilities here... :^)

-- Bert --
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