I had this old plasma globe laying around so I opened it up and found what I think is a ZVS circuit(I have ZERO knowledge of high voltage electronics and I may be wrong). I also have a wound tesla coil with about 650 turns of 21.5 cm diameter pipe for secondary and 30 turns of the primary. The wire thickness for the secondary is REALLY thin(about the thickness of our hair) and the primary is thicker(about 2.2mm diameter with insulation).
- Can I just plug in the output of my ZVS into one end of the primary and the ground of the ZVS circuit and hope it works?
- Will that work or do I need something else? Any help is really appreciated.
Best Answer
Tesla coils work off of resonance between the primary and secondary circuits. The resonant frequency of the primary tank circuit is set by the primary inductor and capacitor and is designed to match the resonant frequency of the secondary. In your case, you have an existing driver circuit which may or may not match the resonant frequency of your coil. If you've tuned a coil before, you know what the effect even a small mismatch in frequency can have on the output, so I doubt you'll see much if you hook it up.
Edit: also, plasma globes use maybe a few watts and even a small Tesla coil will take a few hundred, so your 21.5cm secondary setup will be several orders of magnitude underpowered.