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Hey everyone! I know Im kinda new because I havent built a tesla coil since October and It didnt work very well due to the fact that was my first one. I dismanteled it. I Just bidded on this and hopefully Ill win it. I have a 30ma 12kv transformer so it may be hard. Can you guys give me some links to some capacitors that are good? I also need a new secondary winding.
Registered Member #1062
Joined: Tue Oct 16 2007, 02:01AM
Location:
Posts: 1529
Current does not matter for a spark gap. I think by 60ma he meant it will quench the gap at 60ma. I would say try to make one yourself, there cheaper, and its much funner. Good capacitors would be the 942C line from CDE (cornell duibler)
Current does not matter for a spark gap. I think by 60ma he meant it will quench the gap at 60ma. I would say try to make one yourself, there cheaper, and its much funner. Good capacitors would be the 942C line from CDE (cornell duibler)
Registered Member #1225
Joined: Sat Jan 12 2008, 01:24AM
Location: Beaumont, Texas, USA
Posts: 2253
Well, spark gaps will work on any current, as long as it is not so high that it melts. But the best caps that i know of are maxwell, CDE(cornell dubilier), panasonic and WIMA.
Here is CDE website: That is actually a link to their catalog, but those are the type of capacitors that you want. They are the 942c series, polypropylene.
On ebay, the cde caps:
There are different auctions for them, and some have 10, some 12, some 24 and one is something like 100 i think. Do not get any other so called 'tesla coil' capacitors from ebay though, most of them are NO GOOD. Ask the forum first :)
Long list of good and bad capacitors.
I started replying to this like an hour ago, let me guess, i was not first? :P.
Need anymore help, just ask :)
Edit: NOPE! wasn't first. Anyway, i just wanted to say, if you need a capacitor calculator, go to deepfriedneon.com . It will calculate the amount of capacitors you need for the value you needed, and type in your transformer specs and it will tell you the needed capacitor value in nanofarads. But, you want LTR capacitor value, also known as larger than resonant. The purpose of this is to keep the transformer voltage from getting too high. For ltr, i believe you take the resonant size and multiply that by 1.414. For convince, the right LTR capacitor size for your nst is 9.3nf for a static spark gap and arsg, and 12.6 nanofarad for a srsg calculated with teslamap. Also, the capacitor that you get will probably only have hald the ac rating of the nameplate dc rating. In other words, if you had 2000 volt dc capacitors to use on your nst, you would need at least 12 in series, and actually more so that you have a few kv safety margin to ensure long life. But you might have to make series/parallel strings of capacitors to get the correct capacitance at a high enough voltage. Say you got the 2000vdc .15uf cde caps. You would want 12 in series for a srsg, and for static gap or arsg you would want about 16 in series. It would cost alot, but hey, you would have a pretty good voltage, meaning that would last awhile. It is 32kv dc, so about 16kvac, which would be perfect for your transformer.
Well, spark gaps will work on any current, as long as it is not so high that it melts. But the best caps that i know of are maxwell, CDE(cornell dubilier), panasonic and WIMA.
Here is CDE website: That is actually a link to their catalog, but those are the type of capacitors that you want. They are the 942c series, polypropylene.
On ebay, the cde caps:
There are different auctions for them, and some have 10, some 12, some 24 and one is something like 100 i think. Do not get any other so called 'tesla coil' capacitors from ebay though, most of them are NO GOOD. Ask the forum first :)
Long list of good and bad capacitors.
I started replying to this like an hour ago, let me guess, i was not first? :P.
Need anymore help, just ask :)
About how much nF would I need I found a single 30nf cap here and a 0.1 uF capacitor bank here
Registered Member #1225
Joined: Sat Jan 12 2008, 01:24AM
Location: Beaumont, Texas, USA
Posts: 2253
Matrex30 wrote ...
Arcstarter wrote ...
Well, spark gaps will work on any current, as long as it is not so high that it melts. But the best caps that i know of are maxwell, CDE(cornell dubilier), panasonic and WIMA.
Here is CDE website: That is actually a link to their catalog, but those are the type of capacitors that you want. They are the 942c series, polypropylene.
On ebay, the cde caps:
There are different auctions for them, and some have 10, some 12, some 24 and one is something like 100 i think. Do not get any other so called 'tesla coil' capacitors from ebay though, most of them are NO GOOD. Ask the forum first :)
Long list of good and bad capacitors.
I started replying to this like an hour ago, let me guess, i was not first? :P.
Need anymore help, just ask :)
About how much nF would I need I found a single 30nf cap here and a 0.1 uF capacitor bank here
I just updated the first post. Check it out, but yea, you would need about 9nf for a static gap or arsg, and 12 for a srsg. But those capacitors on the two links that you provided will not be any good. The first one is not a good material and not made for pulse like a tesla coil and it would take 3 in series to get the proper rating, and the second one has the right capacitance, but the voltage rating is way too low. It would be something like 6kvac, and that is more than 2 times too low. You should go with the 16 cde capacitors from ebay on the above post. Yes, it is very expensive, but to have a decent tesla coil, you must spend alot of money.
Well, spark gaps will work on any current, as long as it is not so high that it melts. But the best caps that i know of are maxwell, CDE(cornell dubilier), panasonic and WIMA.
Here is CDE website: That is actually a link to their catalog, but those are the type of capacitors that you want. They are the 942c series, polypropylene.
On ebay, the cde caps:
There are different auctions for them, and some have 10, some 12, some 24 and one is something like 100 i think. Do not get any other so called 'tesla coil' capacitors from ebay though, most of them are NO GOOD. Ask the forum first :)
Long list of good and bad capacitors.
I started replying to this like an hour ago, let me guess, i was not first? :P.
Need anymore help, just ask :)
About how much nF would I need I found a single 30nf cap here and a 0.1 uF capacitor bank here
I just updated the first post. Check it out, but yea, you would need about 9nf for a static gap or arsg, and 12 for a srsg. But those capacitors on the two links that you provided will not be any good. The first one is not a good material and not made for pulse like a tesla coil and it would take 3 in series to get the proper rating, and the second one has the right capacitance, but the voltage rating is way too low. It would be something like 6kvac, and that is more than 2 times too low. You should go with the 16 cde capacitors from ebay on the above post. Yes, it is very expensive, but to have a decent tesla coil, you must spend alot of money.
Ok so what kind of capacitors would I need to get at least 6" or 7" arcs into the air?
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Can you guys help me with my tesla coil please?
