---- mikelow ----

high voltage

These plasma experiments were operated at a conservative guess of 20 KVAC sourced from a 12 VDC sealed lead acid battery. The readings were taken from a meter attached to the battery to give me an idea of the energy consumption. The readings vary +-5 Volts due to the changing conditions of the load.

spherical bulb

A spherical 4.5 inch diameter 60 Watt bulb. Wildly fluctuating readings and highly energetic. The green images are simply inverted colors, they help me to see things I wouldn't necessarily see with the normal color image.

3.10 Amps at 12.89 VDC, 40 Watts

Closeup of the filament.

This fiery path is from my finger being towards the center of the filament on the bulb. This path is more flame like in behavior and exhibits faster heating of my finger.

Here you can see my finger tips as the purple glow on the back of the bulb. The interesting phenomenon here is the smaller paths that develop around my finger.

Some side and head on shots.

I was trying to get a good shot of my finger. This burns my finger after a couple of seconds in one spot. In one picture you can kind of see that the grooves of my fingerprints are the leap off point for the lighter plasma.

small incandescant bulb

1.20 Amps at 12.56 VDC, 15 Watts
8 x 10 inch aluminum foil earth ground plate beneath 1/8 inch polycarbonate

Wow, looks like you see a magnetic field formed from the tiny coil inside the bulb. I am unsure if this is exactly a magnetic field though. There is a current flowing through the coil so it should be, I just never expected it! Looks like a coronal loop of some sort.

Image courtesy of the Transition Region and Coronal Explorer

I created a composite of the cornal loop image and the small bulb to see how things would lay. I rotated and scaled the bulb image into place. This composite maybe misleading though.

Are gasses circulating right beneath the chromosphere carrying a massive current at super high voltages? Is some sort of gas coil set up? I would have to set up an experiment to test this. How would this gas coil be arranged? Circulate two temperature differing gases within a highly charged vacuum?

Interesting.

hard disk platter

A smalll platter from a laptop hard disk. Make up of platter? Metal coated plastic?

1.31 Amps at 12.51 VDC, 16.3 Watts
8 x 10 inch aluminum foil earth ground plate beneath 1/8 inch polycarbonate
note: electropolished metal lends itself to an extremely even distribution of the plasma.

rail

A rail configuration set up with some strips of aluminum foil. Wondering if I could make a TEA laser?

10.5 Watts
8 x 10 inch aluminum foil earth ground plate beneath 1/8 inch polycarbonate

stainless steel rod

A 12 inch long, 1/4 inch diameter, 1/16 thick stainless steel rod. Hmmm, electrostatic sprayer, printer, scanner...

1.47 Amps at 12.59 VDC, 18.5 Watts
8 x 10 inch aluminum foil earth ground plate beneath 1/8 inch polycarbonate

stainless steel sphere

A 1 inch diameter stainless steel sphere placed atop a mirror.

1.52 Amps at 12.55 VDC, 19 Watts
8 x 10 inch aluminum foil earth ground plate beneath 1/8 inch polycarbonate

spark gap

Solid copper wire.

fluorescence

Driving a fluorescent tube with an amp. Here is a really simple way to pulse a fluorescent tube.

If you don't know what is going on with the high voltage of a fluorescent lamp, do a little reading and first get aquainted with it.

Get a 12 Volt DC fluorescent lamp, not to big, say about a three feet max. Instead of connecting it to a 12 Volt battery, just connect it to the speaker outputs of your stereo. Make sure the volume is turned all the way down on your stereo, then slowly increase the volume, until the tube lights.

Don't go to loud or you may destroy the lamp. This isn't generally good for the tube, as it will eventually blow it out. But what the hey.

Here I used a 12 Volt DC cold cathode inverter. Fluorescent tubes are generally wired in a fashion that is to keep the user safe from high voltages. Just keep in mind what is happening at the anode and cathode.