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Re: Performance degrading over time

The caps are not heating up.  Not even warm.

No, no blower or vacuum on the gap.  Is evacuating going to improve
performance, and if so, how?

After re-grinding the bolts and re-gapping, performance is about where it
was before.  At least for the 10 minutes or so I had it running last
night.

thanks,
Ron
ronwes1@juno.com

On Mon, 13 Mar 2000 22:13:28 -0700 Tesla List <tesla@pupman.com> writes:
> Original Poster: "Adam" <adamsmith@mediaone.net> 
> 
> > Original Poster: "Ron West" <ronwes1@juno.com>
> > 
> > I am tuning a 4" coil using a 15/30 NST for power.  Last night I 
> had
> > roughly tuned it in at 5 3/4 turns using a SG and a 16.8nF MMC.
> > Everything was working quite well giving 12-15" sparks (not a lot 
> but
> > much better than my previous ignition coil power supply gave me) 
> when
> > tuning seemed to go out the window.  I found myself having to 
> adjust the
> > gap smaller and smaller, chasing that 'sweet spot'.  Something 
> seriously
> > wrong here.  In the end I managed to fry one leg of the NST, 
> probably due
> > to my safety gap being set too wide (it never once fired).
> > 
> > One thing I am wondering about is the SG, which is made of 7 gaps 
> using
> > stainless steel bolts.  It doesn't get very hot, but it was 
> blackened and
> > pitted after probably no more than 15-20 minutes duty.  I've 
> ground them
> > down smooth again and I'll be able to try the coil again tonight 
> to see
> > if performance is back to normal.  But the question I want to ask 
> is
> > whether the oxidation of stainless steel could produce compounds 
> which
> > would impair conductivity and produce the kind of problems I'm 
> seeing.
> 
> 
> OK Ron, there are a couple of things that could be going on here.  
> First,
> how are you evacuating the gap during the run? Do you have a blower 
> or
> vacuum cleaner sucking the ions and vaporized metal free?
> 
> Second- are your capacitors heating up? Feel them after a run.  If 
> they are
> heating, they will be changing capacitance on you and detuning the 
> tank
> quite a bit.  In this case, you need less power or less-lossy caps.
> 
> -Adam
> adamsmith@mediaone.net
> 
>