Extreme Electronics  

Tesla Coils
A description of each of the tesla coils I've built

Spark & Arc Pictures
Sparks & arcs Electrical discharge pictures

EE at Teslathons
Pictures from UK Teslathons and tesla coil exhibitions

How Tesla coils work
Diagrams of how a tesla coil works

Parts of a Tesla Coil
The componants that make up a tesla coil

Other HV stuff
Other High Voltage equipment and things that don't fit anywhere else

Calculation&Formulae
Tesla coil or high voltage related calculations, formulae and tables

Tesla Coil Glossary
A list of 
TLA's & FLA's tesla coil and high voltage terms

Links
A list of Links to other Tesla Coil or high voltage related Sites

A Breif description of how spark gap tesla coils works.

I've tried to make the descriptions as simple as possible and I've tried not to use electronic or technical terms.
Some electronic or technical terms are of course un-avoidable.

Voltage is applied , the primary capacitor (C) charges , the voltage across the primary capacitor increases.

Spark gap (SG) fires, when the voltage across C reaches the spark gap break down voltage.

Capacitor (C) is discharged through the spark gap (SG) and primary coil (P).

The magnetic field in the primary (P) increases as the voltage across the capacitance (C) decreases.

When the voltage across the capacitor (C) is zero, the field in the primary coil (P) starts to collapse, creating a voltage which re-charges the capacitor (C).

This creates an alternating current in the primary coil (P).

Because the secondary coil (S) is connected (by transformer action) to the primary coil (P). The alternating current in the primary coil is transferred to the secondary coil (S).

It takes a few of the above cycles for all of the power to be transferred into the secondary coil (S).

The topload (T) and the secondary coil (S) are designed to swap power between them in the same way and at the same rate as the primary capacitor (C) and the primary coil (P). This matching of frequencies multiplies the induced voltage in the secondary coil (S).

When there is more voltage than the topload can hold on its surface. The voltage breaks out into an arc.

This process continues until there is no more power in the primary capacitor (C) and primary coil (P). As there is now not enough voltage to maintain the arc across the spark gap (SG), The arc extinguishes.

This alows the capacitor(C) to charge again and the sequence repeats.




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