Learning Outcomes

This was a small project that was sponsored by Etta Kappa Nu (HKN). We worked in a small group, of 5, to create the circuitry and the coil itself. This works on the principle of physics and electromagnetic waves. The lamps are lit because the generated electromagnetic waves are exciting the molecules to the point where they are moving around and colliding with each other to generate the light. Under normal conditions the molecules are excited when the lamp is connected to an electrical socket.

How it Works

The reason why this project is code named slayer exciter, well mainly the exciter bit, is because of the way the florescent light bulbs are illuminated. The Tesla coil generates a strong electromagnetic field and when the light bulbs enter this field the electromagnetic waves excite the molecules within the light bulbs. In short the molecules receive energy from these waves and it causes them to bounce around and collide with there neighbors--where the illumination occurs.

The circuit is shown below. Even though the circuit is simple this project required many other aspects such as the creation of the coil itself.

NOTE: The input source to this circuit is a Direct current (DC) source but a transformer only works when an alternating source (AC) is used. Due to this reason we used a power transistor to modulate the input between on and off to deliver an alternating input to the air core transformer.

Schematic