This is where we’ll put project updates and details as we progress. We can always be reached at [contact |at| kineticsteamworks (dot) org]
I put a little teaser video of what we are doing here:
UPDATE 9 September- we’ve wound a few tesla coil secondaries of increasing size and have been testing.
UPDATE 20 September- we fired up Pappy and load tested the generator- we got about 10 kilowatts into a 6 kilowatt load (they were heater elements that we thought were for heating water, so we submerged them into a trashcan full of water, but apparently, they were for heating air, so the cooling of the water allowed them to run cooler and draw more current. The 12″ wide belt we used worked flawlessly and tracked true and never came off or oscillated on starting or stopping. Video and pics to come very soon of that (See our Facebook page for more timely updates: https://www.facebook.com/kineticsteamworks ). This solid state driver design of the coil is much more efficient than a traditional spark gap coil and right now we’re having the problem of getting TOO MUCH spark- it’s arcing from the secondary to the primary with only a few hundred watts (and it’s a 5 foot long secondary). We’re going to have to do a flat primary instead of the helical and get it closer to the bottom of the secondary. I brought my old Roland RD-600 full size keyboard to the shop and we’re going to let the public play it through the coil as an interactive part of the exhibit.