Ignition coil spark

[KeepTryingHarder]

I managed to get about 2-3 inch sparks out of an ignition coil....sh*t they hurt..

[furulevi]

@KeepTryingHarder oooaaaa :) what circuit did you use ??

[KeepTryingHarder]

@furulevi

It was a couple of years back now.....i've moved on to Tesla coills :P

i think i had a 555 timer putting out a square wave, which controlled a N-Channel mosfet. i can't quite remember the frequency sorry. The sparks were so big i had to silicon an insulated wire into the top of the ignition coil to stop it from racing over the surface to the negative terminal. I used a 7.2ah sealed lead acid battery to power it, no idea how many amps it drew. Sorry i can't remember the frequency.

[Volta500]

You need a heatsink on that poor transistor.

[DanielTseng100]

i have the same transformer

[jrw6137]

plasma cutting^^

[furulevi]

@jrw6137 point welding machine :))

[jrw6137]

@furulevi nope because point wielding uses high current this one is based on high Voltage

[furulevi]

@jrw6137 ...ok, I was just joking, "plasma cutting" is a better comparison.

[mariasorinn]

@furulevi any idiot can do this

[joeylawn36111]

You may get a better spark with a sharper metal point.

[a380rockerfan]

I'd put a heatsink on the transistor.

[seanrquinn]

So...... max of 1 ampere? 1000mA = 1A, no?

[furulevi]

@seanrquinn 1000 mili Amps are 1 Amp, but the transformer can can give a little bit more too, but it gets hot pretty fast.

[MrMurphy1025]

is the PWM and the capacitor nessesary for this to work?

[furulevi]

@MrMurphy1025 The PWM breaks the current pretty fast so you can get a continuous spark, you can make sparks without the PWM too, for example by breaking the circuit with your hand, but much slower (more elapsed time between 2 sparks), and about the capacitor…. As I remember that is more just a protection for the PWM circuit, once I made sparks without it and soon later my PWM was not working anymore. (some high voltage Back EMF ?!? …I don’t know)

[MrMurphy1025]

@furulevi thanks for the info man.

[jeppoification]

do you know what the specs are on the cap? there is another vid where this guy gets an awesome spark happening, your vid is much clearer though on setup

[furulevi]

@jeppoification on the capacitor is written "47nJK", probably 47 nano Farad

[jeppoification]

i would like to do just this, but could you explain why the positive is earthed on the housing and is the capacitor needed on the negative side? i am a noob obviously but would like not to get shocked again cheers

[furulevi]

@jeppoification Without the line between the positive and the housing the sparks are much smaller (I write these from my earlier memories, hope I'm correct), and the capacitor is some type of protection for the pwm circuit if I remember well... I'm no pro either

[xsports49]

dont the diodes create a voltage drop? so it would be putting out less then 12 volts?

i'm trying to drive an igntion coil with a pwm that is a little more complex but i cant get it to work haha but it looks like your not having a problem so i must be doing something wrong

[furulevi]

@xsports49 diodes create some voltage drop, but the pwm I used works between 3-12 Volts too and the ignition coil amplifies it, could be your pwm the problem, I have another more complex pwm too but I haven't managed to make sparks with that one (makes music instead in the coil, not sparks) ;))