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Registered Member #397
Joined: Wed Apr 19 2006, 12:56AM
Location: Western Washington
Posts: 125
Hi Chris,
It's magnet wire, but its not my final tickler coil. Its a leftover junker from an old coil so I'm kind of using while I fine tune the coil. For my final coil, I have some insulated braided cloth wire that I'm going to use. Then I'm going to soak the cloth in polyurethane, possibly vacuum suck it so it'll draw the polyurethane into it. Then I'm going to coat it over and over and over with polyurethane to give it better insulation properties.
Then I'll probably stress test it at 140VAC bursts to see if it arcs over. I might have to figure out a way to make a lip on the top of the coilform to discourage it from arcing. I might also try a gradient ring to see if it can make any difference. Given the nature of this build, it wouldn't look correct if I added a plexiglas tube between the primary and secondary for additional insulation value.
I've already noticed many strange things now that I'm paying attention when tuning this thing. How you hook up your feedback coil leads seems to affect it, as well as rotating it on the coilform one way or the other. Even tuning it to Fres with and without the toroid seemed to produce slightly different streamer characteristics. It's very neat indeed and I am sure all this headache up front will pay off when it runs dead reliably!
I haven't tried changing coupling at all yet by moving the primary up or down with respect to the secondary. I might have to try this tomorrow.
Also does running the tickler below the primary seem to make any sense? I tried it temporarily and it seems to work, but I notice almost no one does this. I guess there is no shortage of stuff to explore!
Registered Member #2028
Joined: Mon Mar 16 2009, 08:13PM
Location: Norway
Posts: 319
It is stunning, even with that ugly bucket and primary. It looks like it was stolen from Tesla's lab with a time machine. I love the fact that even though this coil looks ancient, most parts are new and modern. Steampunk at its best!
Registered Member #397
Joined: Wed Apr 19 2006, 12:56AM
Location: Western Washington
Posts: 125
Thanks for all the kind words! The next few days are supposed to be in the mid to high 80's which is 10-15F above normal. It also means 10-15F above ambient in the garage so I'm going to take a break from working on this thing. I get sluggish when it's over 75F.
Conner, the base pieces are 12x12" pieces of oak. The overall height is just over 31".
Registered Member #543
Joined: Tue Feb 20 2007, 04:26PM
Location: UK
Posts: 4992
An insulation technique for HV wiring in hot places that was very popular in the Thermionic Age was to use thread-on ceramic (porcelain) beads. This does mean that the wire is only insulated to a point, and must be specially routed, but ceramic beads had a role to play on the top caps of big valves where the temperature might exceed 200 Celsius.
Registered Member #3368
Joined: Thu Oct 28 2010, 05:58PM
Location: Fayetteville Arkansas
Posts: 1
Amazing look ! The amount of detail that has gone into this piece is inspiring! I know you have heard a lot of great things about your project and many people have thanked you for posting it, but I had to personally say thank you ! I work in R& D and so much of the emphasis is on numbers and how small we can make it. I really enjoyed seeing something as esthetically pleasing as this.
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The Tesla Thermionic Valve Wireless Energy Transmitting Apparatus
