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Finn Hammer

Sun Jun 06 2010, 09:09PM

Registered Member #205 Joined: Sat Feb 18 2006, 11:59AM
Location: SkÃ¸rping, Denmark
Posts: 741

We had first light tonight, and tested the tapping point to 2kA where it was able to tap smoothly and without letting out any smoke.
The following video was recorded.

What you hear and see is the current ringdown on the scope, and the streamer developing. We start with one half turn too low, and tune up towards a good tuning point, where notches appear, then we shorten the on-time untill it coincides with the first notch.
Notice how the current decreases as the streamer increases, and that the streamer don't get any shorter, when we shorten the on-time in the end.
The sweet spot is hard to locate, as it appears very sharply within less than 5 centimeters on the coil.

Cheers, Finn and Daniel

hvguy

Mon Jun 07 2010, 10:30PM

Registered Member #289 Joined: Mon Mar 06 2006, 10:45AM
Location: Conroe, TX
Posts: 154

Wow Finn, congratulations on pulling off an incredible design. It's already interesting to hear your tuning point is so narrow, I can't wait to see it make huge arcs! Have you played with the coupling yet? Great work....

Finn Hammer

Tue Jun 08 2010, 08:17AM

Registered Member #205 Joined: Sat Feb 18 2006, 11:59AM
Location: SkÃ¸rping, Denmark
Posts: 741

hvguy wrote ...

Wow Finn, congratulations on pulling off an incredible design. It's already interesting to hear your tuning point is so narrow, I can't wait to see it make huge arcs! Have you played with the coupling yet? Great work....

Thanks, Aron

Haven't played with coupling to any great extent, but enough to visualize, that it doesn't have a very dramatic effect. I have not understood Antonio's writings

well enough to memorise them, but I feel that the holy gail lies buryed in there, and I built this machine to be able to investigate that.
I don't know if this sounds familiar but, the day of final light was occupied with tasks like *making those motor controllers work* and we also did not know if the tapping point was going to be up to it. So we decided to put the ultimate restraint on ourselves: Go for recording that video, period.
It does not appear as obvious to many others, but *I* think it is the most important Tesla Coil Video recorded in a long time.
Tuning of the DRSSTC may have been discussed in great detail in the past, but then I have missed it. A paper that pins it down, and supports the claims with easy to understand videos is what is needed by the average Joe's, like myself. The gap between Antonio and Average needs to be filled.

Cheers, Finn Hammer

This will not happen in short order, as I am moving to another town. I doubt I will have time for any extensive testing in the next couple of months

hvguy

Thu Jun 10 2010, 04:43AM

Registered Member #289 Joined: Mon Mar 06 2006, 10:45AM
Location: Conroe, TX
Posts: 154

Yes, working out all the little details of the system, especially when there are numerious PCBs/uCs involved can be time consuming, I'm glad to see you got some video.

Having all this information presented in video form will certainly be a great asset to future coilers seeking to understand the nuances of Tesla Coil operation. I agree with you, this design could very well be one of the most relevant ever. I'm surprised to see a small response here, at least the TCML has provided better feedback. I must say, with all you've done to progress this hobby with this design a book could very well be in order.

I hope your up coming move involves a larger shop space and maybe an open field to run this coil in

Steve Conner

Thu Jun 10 2010, 09:14AM

Registered Member #30 Joined: Fri Feb 03 2006, 10:52AM
Location: Glasgow, Scotland
Posts: 6706

hvguy wrote ...

I'm surprised to see a small response here

We're all still in shock.

I don't think there is any consensus on DRSSTC tuning yet. I have one way of doing it that only works with my PLL drivers. Steve Ward has two other ways of doing it, one for small coils, another for large coils, that work with his feedback driver. I stopped doing research, and my stuff is pretty outdated now, so if you're looking for a consensus, do what the other Steve says.

Much of the discussion in the past was really argument about whose method was best. I believe that my method ended up best for small coils, and Steve Ward's for large coils. He demonstrated real improvements in power output and efficiency by tuning his big coils for a notch, but in a small coil, not enough energy is transferred by the time of the first notch.

The tuning point you found in the video corresponds to Steve's "Large coil" method.

Dalus

Thu Jun 10 2010, 11:34AM

Registered Member #639 Joined: Wed Apr 11 2007, 09:09PM
Location: The Netherlands, Herkenbosch
Posts: 512

Wow, very nice. This coil is great for demo's on the principals of operation of a coil. You did a great job

vasil

Thu Jun 10 2010, 05:56PM

Registered Member #229 Joined: Tue Feb 21 2006, 07:33PM
Location: Romania
Posts: 506

Very good work, I read every new post here and on TCML and I am happy to see how the coils of the future are made today...
My DRSSTC experiences ended a few years ago, so no much feedback from me too. And you build at large scale.....I will never be able to replicate this on small coils..sad but true.

Daniel Uhrenholt

Fri Jun 11 2010, 07:27AM

Registered Member #125 Joined: Fri Feb 10 2006, 01:52PM
Location: Aalborg, Denmark
Posts: 155

hvguy wrote ...

I hope your up coming move involves a larger shop space and maybe an open field to run this coil in

Finn and I are both moving to another town this summer, and we are looking for some kind of lab in the area:-) It would be great to have all of our equipment in one place, as there is not enough space in our apartments to do any experiments at all... I hope that we find a place that is big enough to have Diable Tonnere standing for a longer period of time to do experiments and documentation on tuning. And also some kind of yard where we can do experiments on Thumper, but the problem is to find a place where there is not so many neighbors to worry about...

Cheers, Daniel

Nicko

Fri Jun 11 2010, 03:32PM

Registered Member #1334 Joined: Tue Feb 19 2008, 04:37PM
Location: Nr. London, UK
Posts: 615

Just wanted to say that this is so very impressive - big coils worry me a bit (my own limits), but good engineering is always a thing of beauty.

Cheers

rp181

Wed Jun 16 2010, 10:16PM

Registered Member #1062 Joined: Tue Oct 16 2007, 02:01AM
Location:
Posts: 1529

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