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    Building, troubleshooting and testing of these amplifiers should only be
    performed by someone who is thoroughly familiar with
    the safety precautions around high voltages.

Plasma/ionic

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a333bt

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Joined 2004
Re: sound quality

audiobot said:
Hi,

I built one of these last year. It was a great fun project. I used a sort of synthesis of Colin Joye's scheme and Ulhrich Haumann (they may both be misspelled). The EL/PL509 or 519 was the tube of choice for both and I think it is the tube that was used in the last commercial products. I screen modulated mine from the output of a small 6V6 PP fed through a line transformer run backwards to modulate the screen.

Anyway, I think the reason they are more like works in progress is that there are many ways and many tubes that would work fine. The secret is in the tuning of the coils and capacitance. That makes a huge difference in sound quality and efficiency. I emphasize HUGE. Until some one makes a standard tank circuit, and then it's not DIY, it will always be that way.

I do encourage you to try it, it is a cheap fun project. When you want to make it a permanent part of your system is when the real work will start. You will have to figure out a good shielding scheme for the RFI and build in the types of safety precautions that are necessary for a fire generating beast that runs on high voltage and current.

There is a lot of information to be gleaned from old patents if you want to search there. The original one, from 1952 or 3, used a pair of 807s. The 6146 have been used and I was thinking a 4-65 or 4-125 might make a good option. Read up on radio transmitters and vacuum tube tesla coils, they have a lot more in common than anything out of the audio world.

If you have any specific questions, ask and I will see if I can dig up my notes and literature.

By the way, they do sound incredible and it is on my short list of things to revisit.

Enjoy,
Michael
Click to expand...


audiobot said:
I've not had much experience with different ESL speakers. I will say the the plasma tweeter had a sound quality I have not heard before. In it's simplest form it is a pure point source and that does somehow seem to make a unique difference.

If you are familiar with HV work and have a variable power supply that can give you a 150mA or so, you should be able to knock up a working model in an afternoon or two. Then you can decide for yourself if it is worth pursuing to the extent of being able to add it into your system.

I didn't notice any problems with NO2 in the hundred or so hours I ran mine. Ozone production was a different story. It may seem funny, but when the system was tuned and playing the loudest, lowest distortion, etc the ozone production seemed to be at a minimum, almost indetectable and similar to one of those ionic air fresheners. Overall sound output level is a problem you will have to deal with, they are not power efficient to say the least. On the other hand I am judging from the standpoint of running them almost full range most of the time I was playing. If horn loaded, my rough experiments, they are loud, but lose the point source effect. I do think horn loading could be used to minimize ion migration as well, it that remains a concern with you.

I will try to dig out some old response files and maybe I can draw a schematic. Like I said though, it is a piece of cake to toss up a prototype. Probably some other people on the forum have had more experience with these than I have, though.

Michael
Click to expand...

Hi Michael,
did you manage to draw schematic for plasma tweeter?
I would be VERY interested for this.

best regards, Bostjan
 
K

KBK

Member
Joined 2003
I have a industrial/pro level Bown's Gas generator (1600L of gas per hour) I bought just recently. It produces HHO or a monatomic version of Hydrogen and Oxygen mixed in with Diatomic Hydrogen and Oxygen. All debatable, yesiree-bob. point being, is it of any use here?

PS: To say that it does freaky things, would be an understatement.
 
K

KBK

Member
Joined 2003
DigitalJunkie said:
KBK,Does it bubble like a glass of soda when you turn it on?
Could make a helluva cutting torch..I've heard that Browns Gas torches will cut damn-near anything?
Click to expand...

I'm famous for wandering meandering theft of threads, so let's take it elsewhere if you are interested in more info.

It cuts tungsten like BUTTER.
It can barely boil water. It only boils the water molecules that are specificically in contact with the 'flame'. The flame is electrical and endothermic. It heats by disaggregating molecular structure thermally/electrically. Ie, adjacent thermal effect. Thus the more thermally resistant and electrically resistant the material, the faster it heats it. Until liquid, then it slows, as there is suddenly electrical transfer. Ie, from solid to molten metal or rock. Then it will slowly vaporize it - slowly. Teflon, for example, practically explodes. Quartz nearly explodes, and this, upon contact. It 'eats' all effluents from the 'reaction'.

Firebirck, for example, goes -white hot- like popcorn, in a fraction of second.

Basically?

Go revise your second suggestion of thermodynamics. I say 'yours' as I never felt it was much good anyway and never belived it - as it stands today. I don't believe in 'laws' of pyhsics, only ever evolving theories, which by their very existence -MUST- change as new information comes down the line. (in case no one is getting it, I'm pursuing my ongoing battle with SY on this one. :p)

It might make a decent tweeter, zero outgassing (zero effluent), gas created on demand, zero potential for explosion.
 
K

KBK

Member
Joined 2003
Well, there is an aspect that might make it useful for such audio purposes. The flame is electrical in nature. Two, it collapses, or implodes (back to water) at pressures over 20PSI, or thereabouts.

A pulsed..uhm...digital-analog tweeter? now THAT's twisty.

If you are interested in this particular phenomenon, the manufacturer of such, is about 2 hours away from you, in Penticon.

That's all I have to say on such - a FYI. It might be useful as a tweeter, might be otherwise useful to you, and the source of the best gear on the planet for this, is just down the road from you.
 
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