Thread: Tesla COIL

Okay my little sister is building a tesla coil for her science fair and I told her Id help since its dealing with quite a bit of electricity. And I got it all figured out except for what is inbetween the primary and secondary coil, Do you connect those to or leave a gap?

Also I remember my physics teacher telling me its the amps thatll kill you not the volts, but I could have not heard right is this true and if so is the sparks off the secondary coil "safe"?

Okay heres some picture to illustrate my questions.

In this pic the lamp shade is the primary coil, does the white wire connect to the copper wire in the secondary coil

Does a piece of wire in the secondary coil have to be touching the torroid?


The reason Im asking these is because the diagram we're going off of,below, doesnt have the primary and secondary touching.

Erm......What the shitting hell is your little sister doing playing around with dangerous stuff like this ?

Lol - i was going to ask the same thing

Oh, and the primary and secondary coils do not touch!

Originally Posted by leohopkins

Erm......What the shitting hell is your little sister doing playing around with dangerous stuff like this ?

We were watching the prestige and she asked me if the coil was real and that she wanted to build one, I have never been prouder, .

So the secondary coil just sits inside the primary? Also is it necessary to do the equations if its only 6.5kv.

Oh, Sweet Jesus! God help you if you get it wrong !

Originally Posted by leohopkins

Oh, Sweet Jesus! God help you if you get it wrong !

well we finished and it worked alot better than I thought, meaning it worked. It was funny the teacher thought I built it when all did was make sure it was "safe" to turn on and so she was asking my sister all kinds of random questions, I think my little sister actually taught the teacher something.