Many of us admire the genius of Nikola Tesla, who made such discoveries back in the 19th century that not all of his scientific heritage has yet been studied and understood. One of his inventions was called the Tesla coil or Tesla transformer. You can read more about it. And here we will look at how to make a simple Tesla coil at home.

What is needed to make a Tesla coil?

To make a Tesla coil at home, at our desk or even in the kitchen, we first need to stock up on everything we need.
So, first we must find or purchase the following.
The tools we need are:

• Soldering iron
• Glue gun
• Drill with thin drill bit
• Hacksaw
• Scissors
• Insulating tape
• Marker

To assemble the Tesla coil itself, you need to prepare the following:

• A piece of thick polypropylene pipe with a diameter of 20 mm.
• Copper wire with a diameter of 0.08-0.3 mm.
• A piece of thick wire
• Transistor type KT31117B or 2N2222A (can be KT805, KT815, KT817)
• Resistor 22 kOhm (you can take resistors from 20 to 60 kOhm)
• Power supply (Krona)
• Ping pong ball
• A piece of food foil
• The base on which the product will be mounted is a piece of board or plastic
• Wires for connecting our circuit

Having prepared everything you need, we begin making the Tesla coil.

Instructions for making a Tesla coil

The most labor-intensive process for making a Tesla coil at home will be winding the secondary winding L2. This is the most significant element in the Tesla transformer. And winding is a labor-intensive process that requires accuracy and attention.

Let's prepare the base. For this we will need PVC pipe with a diameter of 2 cm.

Mark the required length on the pipe - approximately from 9 to 20 cm. It is advisable to maintain a proportion of 4-5:1. Those. if you have a pipe with a diameter of 20 mm, then its length will be from 8 to 10 cm.

Then we cut off with a hacksaw along the mark left by the marker. The cut must be even and perpendicular to the pipe, since we will then glue this pipe to the board, and a ball will be glued on top.

The end of the pipe must be sanded with sandpaper on both sides. It is necessary to remove the shavings remaining from sawing off a piece of pipe, and also level the surface for gluing it to the base.

One hole must be drilled at both ends of the pipe. The diameter of these holes should be such that the wire that we will use when winding can pass through there freely. Those. these should be small holes. If you do not have such a thin drill, you can solder the pipe using a thin nail, heating it on the stove.

We pass the end of the wire for winding into the pipe.

We fix this end of the wire with a glue gun. We fix it from the inside of the pipe.

We begin winding the wire. To do this, you can use copper wire with insulation with a diameter of 0.08 to 0.3 mm. The winding should be tight and neat. Avoid overlaps. The number of turns is from 300 to 1000, depending on your pipe and wire diameter. In our version, 0.08 mm wire is used. diameter and 300 turns of winding.

After winding is finished, cut the wire, leaving a piece of 10 centimeters.

Pass the wire through the hole and secure with inside with a drop of glue.

Now you need to glue the manufactured coil to the base. As a base, you can take a small board or a piece of plastic measuring 15-20 cm. To glue the coil, you need to carefully coat its end.

Then we attach the secondary winding of the coil to its place on the base.

Then we glue the transistor, switch and resistor to the base. Thus, we fix all the elements on the board.

We make coil L1. For this we need thick wire. Diameter - from 1 mm. and more, depending on your reel. In our case, the thickness is 1 mm. the wire will be enough. We take the rest of the pipe and wind 3 turns of thick insulated wire around it.

Then we put the coil L1 on L2.

We assemble all the elements of the Tesla coil according to this diagram.

Circuit diagram of a simple Tesla coil

We attach all elements and wires to the base using a glue gun. We also glue the Krona battery so that nothing dangles.

Now we have to make the last element of the Tesla transformer - the emitter. It can be made from a tennis ball wrapped food foil. To do this, take a piece of foil and simply wrap the ball in it. We trim off the excess so that the ball is evenly wrapped in foil and nothing sticks out.

We attach the ball in the foil to the upper wire of the L2 coil, pushing the wire inside the foil. We secure the attachment point with a piece of electrical tape and glue the ball to the top of L2.

That's all! We made our own Tesla coil! This is what this device looks like.

Now all that remains is to check the performance of the Tesla transformer we made. To do this, you need to turn on the device, pick it up fluorescent lamp and bring it to the reel. We must see how the lamp brought to us lights up and burns right in our hands!

This means that everything worked out and everything works! You have become the owner of a Tesla coil made by yourself. If problems suddenly arise, check the voltage on the battery. Often, if a battery has been lying somewhere for a long time, it no longer works as expected.
But we hope everything worked out for you! You can try changing the number of turns on the secondary winding of coil L2, as well as the number of turns and thickness of the wire on coil L1. The power supply can also vary from 6 to 15 V for such small coils. Try it, experiment! And you will succeed!

Which is made their hands. I hope that the information described below will be useful to readers and will be used in the manufacture of various homemade, which are based on the principles of electricity.

Step 1: Danger

Unlike other experiments using high voltage, the discharge from the coil can be very dangerous. Yours nervous system and the circulatory system may suffer serious damage. Do not touch the coil under any circumstances.

If this is your first project of this kind, ask someone with experience to help you and follow safety precautions.

Step 2: Gathering Materials

Secondary coil:

• Plastic pipe 38 mm in diameter (the longer the better);
• About 90 m of enameled copper wire with a diameter of 0.5 mm;
• 38 mm plastic adapter;
• 38mm metal floor flange with thread;
• Enamel paint in a can;
• A round, smooth metal object is a terminal for discharging a charge.

Primary coil:

• About 3 m of thin copper pipe.

Capacitors:

• 6 glass bottles;
• Kitchen salt;
• Oil (I used rapeseed);
• Aluminium foil.

power unit high voltage, which produces about 9 kV and 30 mA.

Step 3: Winding the secondary winding

Let's make a small hole in the top of the pipe. Let's thread one end of the wire into it and wrap it around the pipe. Slowly and carefully begin to wind the coil, making sure that the wires do not cross and there are no gaps. This step is the most difficult and tedious, but the time will be well spent - in the end you will get a very high-quality reel. Every 20 turns we put adhesive tape on the wire - it will act as a barrier if the coil starts to unwind. Once the job is complete, wrap electrical tape tightly around the top and bottom of the coil and spray 2 or 3 coats of enamel onto the winding.

For winding the coil was made homemade, which consists of a motor (3 revolutions per minute) and a bearing.

Step 4: Prepare the base and wind the primary winding

Align the metal stand with the center of the bottom board and drill holes for the bolts. Install the bolts upside down. This will allow you to secure the base for the primary winding with nuts with outside crafts. Then we screw it to the base. Let's take copper tube and form an inverted cone out of it.

Arrester - two bolts protruding from wooden board. They are adjustable, allowing for customization.

Step 5: Assembling the Capacitors

Instead of buying capacitors, let's make them their hands. For this we need salty water, oil and aluminum foil. Wrap the bottle in foil and fill it with water. Try to put an equal amount of water in each bottle, as the same volume will help keep the power output stable. Maximum amount salt, which you can dilute in water 0.359 g / ml (however, all calculations ended with the result that a strong saline solution was obtained, so I reduced the amount to 5 grams). Make sure you are using the “correct” amount of salt per volume of water. Now pour a few ml of oil into the bottle. Punch a hole in the lid and run a long wire through it. Now you have one fully functioning capacitor, you need to make 5 more.

Additionally, to keep bottles together, make or find a box for them.

If you are using a 15 kV 30 mA power supply, you need to use 8-12 bottles, not 6!

Step 6: Connecting everything together

We route the wiring in accordance with the diagram. The ground of the secondary winding cannot be placed on the “ground” of the building’s electrical network, in which case it will “burn” all electrical appliances in your house.

Characteristics of my reels:

• 599 turns on the secondary coil;
• 6.5 turns on the main coil.

Step 7: Start the installation

Take it outside the first time you start it up, as it really isn't safe to run such a powerful device indoors (high risk of fire). Click on the switch and enjoy the light show. My PSU with 9kV and 30mA allows the coil to emit a 15cm spark.

Step 8: For the future...

There are a few things that need to change on my next install. The first is the design of the primary winding. It should be more tightly rolled up and consist of more turns. The second is to make the arrester better.

Thank you for your attention!

Nikola Tesla, like many other physicists, devoted many years of his life to studying the energy of currents and methods of its transmission, creating unique developments. One of them was a Tesla coil - a resonant transformer designed to produce high-frequency currents.

Tesla was definitely a genius. It was he who brought the use of alternating current and patented many inventions. One of them is the famous Tesla coil, or transformer. If you have certain knowledge and skills, you can easily create a Tesla coil at home. Let's find out what the essence of this device is and how to create it at home if you suddenly really want it.

What is a Tesla coil and why is it needed?

As noted earlier, a Tesla coil is a resonant transformer. The purpose of a transformer is to change the voltage value of an electric current. These devices are respectively lowering and increasing.

Many are trying to repeat the numerous unique experiments of the great genius. However, to do this, they will have to solve the most important problem - how to make a Tesla coil at home. But how to do that? Let's try to describe it in detail so that you can do it the first time.

How to make a Tesla coil at home with your own hands

On the Internet you can find a lot of information on how to make a musical or mini Tesla coil with your own hands. But we will tell you and clearly show with illustrations how to make a simple 220 Volt Tesla coil at home.

Since this invention was created by Nikola Tesla for experiments with high-voltage charges, it contains the following elements: a power source, a capacitor, 2 coils (the charge will circulate between them), 2 electrodes (the charge will slip between them).

The Tesla coil is used in a variety of devices: from television and particle accelerators to toys for children.

To get started you will need the following parts:

• power supply from neon signs (supply transformer);
• several ceramic capacitors;
• metal bolts;
• hair dryer (if you don’t have a hair dryer, you can use a fan);
• copper wire, varnished;
• metal ball or ring;
• toroidal shapes for coils (can be replaced with cylindrical ones);
• safety bar;
• chokes;
• ground pin.

Creation should occur in the following stages.

Design

First, you need to decide what size the coil should be and where it will be located.

If finances allow, you can create a huge generator at home. But you should remember one thing important detail : The coil creates many spark discharges that greatly heat the air, causing it to expand. The result is thunder. As a result, the created electromagnetic field is able to disable all electrical appliances. Therefore, it is better to create it not in an apartment, but somewhere in a more secluded and remote corner (garage, workshop, etc.).

If you want to determine in advance how long the arc your coil will produce or the power of the required power supply, make the following measurements: divide the distance between the electrodes in centimeters by 4.25, square the resulting number. The final number will be your power in Watts. And vice versa - to find out the distance between the electrodes, Square root power must be multiplied by 4.25. A Tesla coil that will be able to create an arc one and a half meters long will require 1,246 watts. And a device with a one-kilowatt power supply can make a spark 1.37 meters long.

Next we study the terminology. To create such an unusual device, you will need to understand highly specialized scientific terms and units of measurement. And in order not to make a mistake and do everything correctly, you will have to learn to understand their meaning and significance. Here is some information that will help:

1. What is electrical capacitance ? This is the ability to accumulate and hold an electrical charge of a certain voltage. Anything that accumulates electrical charge is called capacitor. Farad is a unit of measurement of electrical charges (F). It can be expressed as 1 ampere second (Coulomb) multiplied by a volt. Typically, capacitance is measured in millionths and trillionths of farads (micro- and picofarads).
2. What is self-induction? This is the name for the phenomenon of the occurrence of EMF in a conductor when the current passing through it changes. High-voltage wires carrying low-ampere current have high self-inductance. Its unit of measurement is henry (H), which corresponds to a circuit in which changing current at a rate of one ampere per second creates an emf of 1 Volt. Typically, inductance is measured in milli- and microhenry (parts per thousand and parts per million).
3. What is resonant frequency ? This is the name of the frequency at which losses in energy transmission will be minimal. In a Tesla coil, this will be the frequency of minimum losses when transmitting energy between the primary and secondary windings. Its unit of measurement is hertz (Hz), that is, one cycle per second. Typically, resonant frequency is measured in thousands of Hertz or kilohertz (kHz).

Gathering the necessary parts

We have already written above what components you will need to create a Tesla coil at home. And if you are a radio amateur, you will certainly have some (or even all) of these.

Here are some features of the necessary parts:

• the power source must supply, through an inductor, a storage or primary oscillating circuit consisting of a primary coil, a primary capacitor and a spark gap;
• the primary coil should be located near the secondary coil, which is an element of the secondary oscillating circuit, but the circuits should not be connected by wires. As soon as the secondary capacitor accumulates a sufficient charge, it will immediately begin to release electrical charges into the air.

Making a Tesla Coil

1. Choosing a transformer. It is the supply transformer that will decide what size your coil will be. Most of these coils are powered by transformers capable of delivering current from 30 to 100 milliamps at a voltage of five to fifteen thousand volts. You can find the required transformer at the nearest radio market, on the Internet, or remove it from a neon sign.
2. Making a primary capacitor. It can be assembled from several smaller capacitors, connecting them in a circuit. Then they will be able to accumulate equal shares of charge in the primary circuit. True, it is necessary that all small capacitors have the same capacity. Each of these small capacitors will be called composite.

You can purchase a small capacitor on the radio market, on the Internet, or remove ceramic capacitors from an old TV. However, if you have golden hands, you can make them yourself from aluminum foil using plastic film.

To achieve maximum power, the primary capacitor must be fully charged every half power cycle. For a 60 Hz power source, charging needs to occur 120 times per second.

1. Designing a surge arrester. To make a single arrester, use a minimum of six millimeter (thick) wire. Then the electrodes will be able to withstand the heat that is generated during charging. In addition, it is possible to make a multi-electrode or rotary spark gap, and also to cool the electrodes by air blowing. An old household vacuum cleaner is perfect for these purposes.
2. We make the winding of the primary coil. We make the coil itself from wire, but you will need a form around which you will have to wind the wire. For these purposes, varnished copper wire is used, which can be bought at an electronics store or simply removed from any old unnecessary electrical appliance. The shape around which we will wind the wire should be conical or cylindrical (plastic or cardboard tube, old lampshade, etc.). Due to the length of the wire, the inductance of the primary coil can be adjusted. The latter should have low inductance, so there should be no a large number of turns. The wire for the primary coil does not have to be solid - several can be fastened together to adjust the inductance during assembly.
3. We assemble the primary capacitor, spark gap and primary coil into one circuit. This circuit will form the primary oscillatory circuit.
4. Making a secondary inductor. Here we also need cylindrical shape where to wind the wire. This coil must have the same resonant frequency as the primary, otherwise losses cannot be avoided. The secondary coil should be higher than the primary one, because it will have more inductance and will prevent the secondary circuit from discharging (which can lead to the primary coil burning out). If there is a shortage of materials to create a large secondary coil, a discharge electrode can be made. This will protect the primary circuit, but will cause that electrode to take the majority of the shocks, resulting in no visible shocks.
5. Create a secondary capacitor, or terminal. It should have a rounded shape. Typically this is a torus (donut-shaped ring) or sphere.
6. Connecting the secondary capacitor and secondary coil. This will be the secondary oscillating circuit, which should be grounded away from the house wiring that powers the Tesla coil source. What is it for? This will prevent high-voltage currents from wandering through the wiring of the house and subsequent damage to any connected electrical appliances. For separate grounding, it will be enough to simply drive a metal pin into the ground.
7. Making impulse chokes. You can make such a small coil that can prevent the spark gap from breaking the power source by winding copper wire around a thin tube.
8. We collect all the details into a single whole. We place the primary and secondary oscillatory circuits side by side, and connect the supply transformer to the primary circuit through chokes. That's all! To use the Tesla coil for its intended purpose, just turn on the transformer!

If the primary coil is too large diameter, you can place the secondary coil inside the primary.

And here is the entire sequence of assembling a Tesla coil in pictures:

Tip 1: if you want to control the direction of the discharges that come out of the secondary capacitor, place any metal object nearby in such a way that there is no contact between both. In this case, the contact will take the form of an arc stretching from the capacitor to the object. Interestingly, if you place a fluorescent lamp or incandescent light bulb nearby, thanks to the Tesla coil they will begin to glow.

Tip 2 : If you want to design and create a quality reel, you need to produce complex mathematical calculations. However, if you cannot do them yourself, look for helpers or formulas from the Internet.

Tip 3 : You should not start building a Tesla coil unless you have relevant engineering experience or knowledge of electronics.

Tip 4 : The latest generation of neon signs contain solid-state power supplies with a built-in residual current device. This makes them unsuitable for creating a Tesla coil.!

The world of physics and electronics is fraught with many secrets and beauty, which, with the proper experience and knowledge, anyone can recreate with their own hands. So, following all the tips listed above, you can always create the legendary Tesla coil at home, amaze your guests and seduce the opposite sex. And if a brilliant mind and thirst for inventions prevent you from studying, just use the services of services for students!

Some images taken from source:

Nikola Tesla is truly a brilliant inventor of all times. He practically created all modern world. Without his inventions, we would not have known about electric current what we know now.
One of the brightest and amazing inventions Tesla is his coil or transformer. Which perfectly demonstrates the transfer of energy over a distance.
To conduct experiments, please and surprise your friends, you can assemble a simple but completely working prototype at home. This does not require a large number of scarce parts and a lot of time.

To make a Tesla Coil you will need:

• CD can.
• A piece of polypropylene tube.
• Switch.
• Transistor 2n2222 (you can use domestic ones like KT815, KT817, KT805, etc.).
• Resistor 20-60 KOhm.
• Wires.
• Wire 0.08-0.3 mm.
• 9V battery or other 6-15V source.

Tools: a stationery knife, a hot glue gun, an awl, scissors and maybe another tool that is found in almost every home.

Making a Tesla coil with your own hands

First of all, we need to cut a piece of polypropylene tube approximately 12-20 centimeters long. Any pipe diameter, take whatever you have on hand.

Let's take a thin wire. We fix one end with electrical tape and begin to wind tightly, turn to turn, until we cover the entire tube, leaving 1 centimeter from the edge. Once we have wound it, we will also secure the second end of the wire with electrical tape. You can use hot glue, but in this case you will have to wait a little.

We take the disc case and make three holes for the wire. See photo.

We cut a groove for the switch with which we will turn our Tesla coil on and off.

To make it look better I painted the box with spray paint.

We insert the switch. Glue the coil wound on the tube with hot glue into the middle of the jar.

Pass the lower end of the wire through the hole.

We take a thicker wire. We will make a power coil from it.

We wrap the wire around the tube. We do not do it closely, at some distance. Coil 4-5 turns.

We pass both ends of the resulting coil through the holes.
Next we assemble the diagram:

I glued the transistor with hot glue to a soda cap, which I had previously glued with hot glue. In general, we fix all the elements, including wires and batteries, with this glue.

Next we make the electrode. Take a ping pong ball, golf ball, or other small ball and wrap it in aluminum foil. Cut off the excess with scissors.

The Tesla coil, which bears the name of the inventor, is an oscillating circuit that consists of two coils. It allows you to obtain a current of high rating and frequency.

So, what do we need:
- switch;
- 22 kOhm resistor;
- transistor 2N2222A;
- connector for crown;
- PVC pipe 8.5 cm long and 2 cm in diameter;
- 9 volt crown;
- copper wire with a cross section of 0.5 mm;
- a piece of laminate;
- glue gun;
- soldering iron;
- a small piece of wire 15 cm long.

First of all, we must wind the copper wire onto the PVC tube, departing from the edges by approximately 0.5 cm. In order to prevent the wire from unwinding at first, the author of the idea advises fixing its end with paper tape.

After we have wound the wire, we also fix the second end with paper tape so that the wire does not wrap. Cut the end of the wire with wire cutters. The reel is ready.

Now you need to glue it to the base of a piece of laminate with a glue gun.

On a piece of laminate we also glue the switch, transistor and crown connector.

Let's move on to connecting the wires. We solder the lower copper wire coming from the coil to the middle contact on the transistor.

We also solder a resistor to the middle contact.

We will need a piece of wire for the secondary winding. We wrap it twice around the coil and fix both ends of the wire with hot-melt adhesive on the base.

Solder the upper end of the secondary winding wire to the free end of the resistor.

Solder the second end of the secondary winding wire to the right contact on the transistor. To make work easier, you can use short sections of wiring.

Next, we solder the contacts from the resistor together with the wire from the secondary winding to the contact from the switch.