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Hi! Thanks for the kind words. It sounds like you've got a whole herd of pigs living in your garage! Glad to hear that you independently "re-discovered" using a welder as a ballast before you took out your neighborhood's power supply. With some precautions you may be able to run a smaller Tesla Coil in your garage. I wouldn't recommend running a pig-driven system in a garage that uses Romex wiring or one having a garage door opener. The near-field RF radiated by the coil can damage or destroy the receiver of the opener (even if it's unplugged!) unless you disconnect the antenna and remote opener switch wiring first. High voltage RF can also be induced onto nearby open wiring or non-grounded conductive objects in the garage (yourself included). Short gaps between metal objects and grounded objects may create a fire hazard from arcing. Also, ungrounded sections of aluminum siding act will like a large antenna, and can create hazardous arcing to nearby grounded conduit or exposed wiring. Finally, streamers from the top of your coil may connect to the rafters in the garage. When this occurs, the sparks will tend to follow (and explode) internal sap channels as they find a path to the nearest ground, sprinkling wood fragments all over like miniature toothpicks, or potentially igniting them in the event of sustained power arcing. The last problem can be avoided by stringing small, grounded wires or chicken wire on the surfaces pf the wooden beams that face your coil in order to provide a more attractive target for the sparks. You may want to consider making a rectangular grounded cage (that encloses the coil) using chicken wire which will act as a poor man's Faraday Cage. By using the above techniques, using the welder's lowest power setting, and using a smaller spark gap setting, you should be able to control the power to a manageable level that will allow you to use a medium sized coil in your garage. Good luck and please play VERY safely. You don't get second chances with distribution transformers
Best regards, -- Bert -- :
: I just rescently recieved 3x50kva pole pigs. These things are way heavier
: than i ever thought(615lbs). I have one hooked up in my garage all roped
: off with warning signs to keep people away. Ive been getting about
: 16" inch arcs with a jacobs ladder with about 20 amps at around 220
: volts feed into the primary winding. The first time i hooked it up, it
: blew the breaker right away. I tried lots of stuff before i finally used
: a welder in series with the leads connected as a current limiting
: device. I couldnt believe that this was already being done by other
: people. I thought it was pretty creative. Anyways nice board. Im
: planning on building a tesla coil soon. I was just wondering if anyone
: could answer this question. I have a garage thats 20'x24' and the
: ceiling is 8' tall. Would it be safe to run a tesla coil built from a
: pig in there? IM thinking not... but i have two ground rods driven out
: side my garage for my experiments with this monster, would it be a good
: idea to build like a halo striking ring around the toriod spaced out a
: few feet to predict the arcing to that? Its just cold outside cause i
: live in Alaska and some of the neighbors might freak also esp the old
: man across the street. Any ways i just have this feeling that 20sq'
: really isnt enough room for safty atleast i dont feel confortable with
: it.
-- Bert --
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