Sparks and Arcs from my Induction Coil (with Dimmer-Driver)

Click on the photos for bigger picture. 
When obtaining these little sparks, I was enjoying my HV-hobby almost as much, as when throwing manifold (up to 20 times) longer ones with the Tesla-coils. The different device has it's own merits, i.e. surprise No.1 was, how much abuse the good-old-cheap leyden-jars have survived; surprise No.2 the flame-like appearence of the Jacobs-ladder arcs for the human eye vs. the banjo-effect on the time exposure photo. The pic's were taken in October 31th, 2001. Enjoy yourself!

Smoothly running 
induction coil at
15.5cm spark (~100kV)
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2 serial leyden-jars
(=375pF) connected:
Horrible noise!
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closeup of  the 8cm (~65kV) 
capacitor discharges.
Amazed the jars support it!
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20cm sparks (~120kV)
starting of sporadic
insulation problems
along inner tube.
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25cm sparks (~145kV)
as seen on this pic',
insulation problems
are becoming serious!
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time exposition photo of 
this Jacobs-ladder shows
the 50Hz BPS, 'cause of
the short dimmer-pulses.
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d = 5cm polished balls,
positioned 48mm(100kV)
comparing to needle points,
13.3cm (90kV) apart.
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"simultaneous" firing of
both gaps starts only at
points 11.1cm(80kV),
which was not expected.
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"simultaneous" firing 
closeup. BTW: the balls
tend yet to fire first.
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pure needle point
15.5 cm discharge.
(~100kV from table)
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...a 20cm spark closeup.
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spectacular, crackling
spark effect around a
23x23x0.5cm acryl-plate
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The very basic
dimmer-circuit has
proven reliable
in all of the above
experiments. The
wall power is about
2.4kVA, when ope-
rating the coil at
100Hz BPS.
homemade dimmer &
induction coil primary
current waveform.
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...this scope-photo of
the primary current will
be replaced by a better
one, when available.
18'458 bytes		 An attempt has been 
taken, in attaining a better
understanding of induction
coils, based on a set
of 35 low-power tests,
literature and pspice-
modelling: please click
my
induction coil analysis
part, if interested.