Steve:
The plastic meter cover has become charged with static electricity. Maybe from your finger as you may have generated a body charge from carpeting, polyester clothing, or who knows what. The meter returned to zero after the charge slowly bled off. Sometimes your damp breath will hasten the bleed off of static charge on meter cover. More of a problem in dry winter air. Less so in times of high humidity. Stubborn cases can sometimes be cured by gently wiping with a clothes dryer softening sheet. In fact, the sheets are claimed to eliminate static charge from polyester type clothing.
Ron Reeland
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From: Tesla <tesla-bounces@xxxxxxxxxx> on behalf of Steve White <steve.white1@xxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, May 9, 2018 11:17 PM
To: Tesla Coil List
Subject: [TCML] Strange Voltmeter Behavior
In the control cabinet for my SGTC I have a Simpson 0 - 300 volts AC Wide-View iron vane voltmeter measuring the voltage from the wall. I briefly powered up the cabinet for a few seconds to check some things and then switched it off. Then, with all power off, I placed my finger over the indicator pointer of the voltmeter and its movement tracked my finger movement through the clear plastic cover! After this strange behavior, the pointer settled at a position substantially above the zero voltage point. It settled at about 30 volts with no power applied. I noticed that as time went by, the pointer gradually settled back to its true zero voltage point. This took about 10 minutes. I have PFC capacitors but I had them switched out at the time. The only other energy storage components that I can think of are the capacitors in the EMI line filter bricks. I don't think it could be static electricity because I tried discharging my body and the pointer still followed my finger. None of
the other voltmeters and ammeters in the control cabinet display this strange behavior. Does anyone know what is going on here?
Steve
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