Stator question - mass or surface area?

[4q1]

I've been reading for weeks, learning and planing an ESL project. Thanks for the wonderful information folks!

In learning about electrostatics, I still have a question about some things said in this forum. Some have suggested that more mass would help a stator, not just in stability, but also in building up a charge. My words not theirs. My intuition tells me differently. Doesn't the charge depend mainly on skin effect - the surface area of a stator? Ignoring mechanical stability, I was considering a quick and dirty test setup with window screen. Wouldn't metal window screen work just as well as a 1mm perforated steel? (this is a bad example because the screen would have a very small surface area & mass - still there are reports here that it works.)

Perhaps a better way to get the question out would be consider a plastic stator, identical to a perforated metal sheet, but with a thin film of deposited copper, much like a printed circuit board.

Does mass matter, or does surface area suffice?

[moray james]

stator mass has no impact on the charge nor for conductivity at these voltages. Perforated plastic worked for Quad with a curve to stiffen it and a cube louvre worked for Acoustat. just my two cents worth, I have built perfed metal and wire stators (insulated and bare wire and screen. the insulated wire method is the least expensive most reliable of any I have seen. I have over many years not seen anyone prove differently. I think that a stator needs to provide resistive damping in order to properly load the diaphragm around 25 - 30% open area. you do want to keep your stator as rigid as you can for obvious reasons. good luck have fun. best regards moray james.

[geraldfryjr]

I have gotten very good results using window screen, Here are a few links to some of my results,

High strength Dielectric Coatings, fact or fiction

ESL woofer- anybody game?

Acoustat panel angles? 8" vs 9" panels?

ESL Diaphragm coating

ESL Diaphragm coating

ESL Diaphragm coating

jer