Tesla coils

A Tesla coil is a high frequency high voltage generator. Tesla coils come in all shapes and sizes. Most of them work with only few passive components. But there is a class of Tesla coils that works with a switch mode power supply that powers the primary coil. These are called solid state Tesla coils. The solid state tesla coils are more interesting because it is possible to change to shape of the discharges or even the sound. On the other hand, solid state Tesla coils are difficult to make, especially ones that "auto-tune" themselves in order to dynamically track the resonant frequency of the main coil.

I made an auto-tuning solid state Tesla coil that can produce half a meter discharges and that has a digital control panel that controls different settings for the coil. On the control panel one can choose if the coil should run on D.C., half wave or full wave rectified power. This controls the sound and appearance of the discharges. There is also a menu option to manually tune the operating frequency with a dial.

I've also made a mini solid state Tesla coil, and a "stereo" mini solid state tesla coil setup, in which the two coils work in anti phase to achieve longer discharges. Pictures of my big SSTC and the small ones can be found in the Tesla gallery menu item on the left side.

For my big Tesla coil, all the schematics and PCB layouts can be found in the design menu item.