SITES

(no particular order)

www.tesladownunder.com
The homepage of my friend Peter. He's a doctor living in Australia, hence the "downunder." He's into tesla coils, levitation, lasers, and always brings exciting and new ideas to the forum. He's got the biggest capacitor bank I've ever seen and finds neat ways to show it off often. His 7ft tesla strike to a ladder picture won him a Nikon D70 camera and a shot in a magazine, and his site is just covered in good pictures.

www.4hv.org
Where I hang out. Currently that's were all my friends are. Hmm... Maybe I need to get out more! I'm the Part Scavenger, because when I signed up about a year ago I didn't have any money and constantly brought things home and took them apart. I'm not sure what my excuse is now.

www.richieburnett.co.uk
Richie Burnett's site. Rock solid Solid State Tesla theory. If you want to know what's really going on inside a tesla coil, especially the traditional SSTC, this is the place to go.

www.steve.4hv.org
Steve Ward's site. Need I say more? Only the most knowledgeable and the nicest guy when it comes to SSTCs. Currently he holds the world record for the longest DRSSTC spark (12') and has the designed the all around best (in my opinion) controller for DRSSTCs.

www.scopeboy.com
Home of Steve Connor (the rock star ;p). A electronics engineer from the UK, brilliant doesn't describe his graymatter. He has one of the nicest DRSSTCs in existence, has achieve 6ft with an OLTC, and I hear tell he's building a bigger DRSSTC...(Odin, the All-Fragger)

http://www.deepfriedneon.com/
Great website. Especially if you're just getting started in Tesla Coils.

www.easternvoltageresearch.com
Home of Daniel McCauley (EVR on 4HV). Smart guy, just finished his new book on DRSSTCs. Looks superb, something was wrong with the publishing, so it's coming out on June 22th 2006.

www.electronics-tutorials.com
Great site for learning about circuits.

 

Distributors

www.Mouser.com
Great prices. I absolutely abhor their website. you can't find anything unless you've got the catalog with you, even with the search function. If you look it up in the catalog they'll send you and use part numbers it's fine.

http://www.goldmine-elec.com/
Surplus distributors, if they have it, it will be DIRT CHEAP. I save on capacitors mainly, and the "goldmine surprise box" is WELL worth it. I buy one every time I order from them. I like the small one better personally.

www.ti.com (Texas Instruments)

www.Digikey.com

All electronics

www.fairchildsemi.com (Fairchild Semiconductor)

www.irf.com (International Rectifier)

ST Micro

Arrow Electronics

RECOMMENDED COMPUTER PROGRAMS
I am to the point where I do not see the point in paying for computer programs. If it's simple, I write it, if it's not, someone else has already written it. Lately, more and more, I have been disappointed by storebought programs and surprised by homewritten and Open Source programming. Plus it's free! Not everything in this list is free, but if it's included, it's been worth paying for. Here are my favorites, I use all the time in no particular order.

 

Faststone Image Viewer
I LOOVE this program, it's more than an image viewer, it a batch renamer, resizer, editor, everything. For standard picture editing, this is the best I've ever found. Fast, small, great interface, all around great program. Every picture on this site was doctored or resized with it. Freeware, Open Source.

The Gimp - Not really easy to use, but has every tool imaginable if you need it and they all work better than anything I've ever paid for. Works cleanly and quickly too. Freeware, Open Source.

Audigy - Great, great tool for editing/recording music. Not too many gimmicks, but clean, quick, easy to use and powerful. Exactly the way I like it. Freeware, Open Source

Blender3d - You've seen the scooter and "Do Not Push" in the gallery. This is a very powerful 3D renderer/animator. It runs clean, a bit confusing at first, but about 2-3 hours of interest will have you easily creating anything in 3D and hooked. Once you get the hang of it, you can animate objects in just minutes. Freeware, Open Source

Alcohol 120% - Very powerful CD/DVD burner. It has error skipping for damaged and protected disks as well as an image drive. Runs clean. Unrestricted Shareware for 30 days, about $40 to buy.

DVDLab Pro- Powerful program that will do anything with DVDs that you want. It *is* user friendly, if you're experienced with DVD creation. Very powerful software. My favorite thing about it is that you can set it to not re-render video before burning to a DVD, something Pinnacle, Nero, and several other programs lack. Therefore, DVDLab can be hours and hours faster with better quality. Unrestricted Shareware for 30 days, well over $100 to buy. Hmm... I'd happily pay 30-40, buy I'm not paying 200 for it. I think I'll be happy backing Window's clock everytime I want to use DVDLab.

ExpressPCB and Schematic Creator
Great little duo of programs. This was written by the ExpressPCB company in attempt for you to design PC boards and email them the specs. Then they ship the custom boards to you. They provide the shematic creator and the PC board layout programs free. The boards are a bit too expensive for my taste, but they allow you to print them out. I then use the gootee process with LaserJet and photopaper... Freeware

dbPowerAmp Music Converter
This program used to be the "Free MP3 Ripper" now it's like $2 because they have to pay some sort of royalty or something. However, you can still find the old, free version... Quick, powerful, runs clean, easy to use, no restrictions.

E Sword
"The Sword of the Lord, with an electronic edge." The Bible on computer. It's free, small, and comes with all kinds of great stuff like every version of the Bible and Concordnances and commentaries. I've got it on my laptop, and if you're like me, you won't read anything unless it's handy.

SwCAD III
This is my all-time favorite electronics computer program. A MUST download. I cannot think of any program that I use more often. If you're looking for a circuit simulator, then this is the program for you. Hundreds of ICs, semis, and you can even set up your own custom components. Component updates are downloadable and sendable. This runs circuit simulations, plots waveforms, etc. and as far as my experience has taken me is 100% accurate. There is no telling how much time this program has saved me, and I have learned alot about electronics with it. Every computer I own has it installed.

Google Desktop Search
No more waiting forever on Window's little dog to dig through your files. Google searches your computer faster than it searches the internet. Not only that, it searches through PDFs, emails, recycle bin, websites viewed in the last several days, (online or offline, you can view them) documents, close matches, just like Google. Windows only searches filenames. Pbbt! Free.

PrimoPDF Creator
Print to PDF. Completely Free, completely awesome.

Microsoft AntiSpyware
Catches stuff that Spybot, Norton, and McAfee all missed. Free from Microsoft, annoying., but not nearly as any other antivirus program.

WinTesla
TeslaCAD
MandK Inductance Calc
Engineering Power Tools

RECOMMENDED BOOKS

"Practical Electronics for Inventors" by Paul Scherz. ISBN#0-07-058078-2
This book, right here is THE BEST, of any electonics book I have ever picked up. If you are new to electronics and are frustrated with trying to figure it all out, this book is the answer. I have had many books that don't tell you everything, or they or just plain confusing. Electronics is confusing anyway but this book the by far the most influentual book source of information I have come across. I rate it ***** and I would count it some of the best money I have ever spent on a book. ($35 IIRC)

Ingenious Mechanisms by Industrial Press
Neat set of books. Every mechanism I could ever think of and would never think of are in these books. Clocks, auto-reversing gears, infinite variable speed mechanical drives... Each includes a drawing and complete description of important features, the mechanism's common functions, materials, etc. Not only are they a great reference, but are interesting enough to sit and read. Somewhat expensive unless you're into that sort of thing, but you can often get a good deal on eBay. There are four and they run about $30ea. There's got to be hundreds of designs in these books though.

Experimental Science vI & vII by George M Hopkins. Lyndsay Publications
VERY cool book, a reprint of a very old book back when they told you stuff you can't find nowadays. Research on everything including geissler tubes, neon, HV transformers, fluid dynamics, primitive radio, on and on and on. It even has a section on AC motor winding and construction. This is truly a gem of a book set not unlike the ones you find hidden deep in the libraries no one's touched in years. The drawings are neat, riminicent of old books. BTW, if you've never heard of Lyndsay Publications, you really need to check them out. They go back and reprint technical books that are great and sell them. I have never bought a "dud" from them.

The McGraw Hill Encyclopedia of Science and Technology Set
I'm willing to bet these are really hard to find, and if so, very expensive. My dad was lucky enough to get them at a book sale, I don't know how much they were, but I guarantee he didn't pay alot for them. This is basically an encyclopedia set, from a technical viewpoint; you won't find Michaelangelo or the Russian Czars. Everything from Electronics, to Biology, Chemistry, Nuclear Physics... This set is better than any encyclopedia I've ever referenced anywhere else, I don't care what you'd pay me, I'm not parting with them ever.

Uncle John's Bathroom Reader Series
I kid you not, I have not found any other book series to be more enjoyable than this one. Don't let the title fool you, you can read this in the bedroom, on vacation, whatever. It is a collection of facts, stories, interesting things from around the world, famous misprints, quotations, etc. Things you would find nowhere else. They come 1-2 pages at a time which make it good for reading in the bathroom if you so desire. They are about 400 pages and about $10. Worth every penny, my family has like 10 of them. In just one you can learn about:

Where coat hangers came from
Humorous Epitaphs
Great bumper stickers (ie. "i suuport publik edekashun." and "Where there's a will, I want to be in it.")
The origin of scotchguard
How famous people such as George Washington and Babe Ruth died. Did you know that Washington was "bled" to death by doctors trying to cure his cold?
Misprints in English from other countries (ie. "Dresses for Street Walking" -Sign in Paris Dress Shop)
The origin of common phrases and words (such as "got his goat")

Great book, I would recommend it to anyone I know; it makes a great gift too.

Neon Techniques by Wayne Strattman
A bit expensive at $40, but contains everything that you ever wanted to know about neon tubes, taking care of neon transformers, gases, pressures, bending and blowing neon glass, plasma globes. Extremely nutrient dense book, 200 something pages.

"Drawing Cartoons" by Usborne Publications.
If you liked any of my cartoons, this is a pretty good book. I think it was three bucks and is a great guide for getting started cartooning.

"Eyewitness Science" Series
This is a neat series of books, they include "Electricity" and "Light" among others. Mainly basic information on the topics, but the pictures are awesome. Also the electricity has lots of old looking setups with brass, etc. For example, the telephone in the gallery came from one of these books.

"Engineer's Mini-Notebook" Series by Archer
This was a Radio Shack exclusive that I'm pretty sure they don't sell anymore. Not really worth tracking down, but worth buying if you have the opportunity. They're full of basic circuits, but like legos you can plug them into one another. I have several other Radio Shack books such as "Basic Electronics" and "Basic Communications," but I would not recommend these as they are confusing, expensive for the information provided, and if read by themselves, they are impossible to comprehend as they are full of "holes." I don't like these two at all. However, I did like a production they did in the 70s-80s? entitled "Getting Started in Electronics." In fact, most of the "Mini-Notebook" series is compiled in this book. It may be hard to find though.

RECOMMENDED MUSIC
In the CD player...

Sugarland - Twice the Speed of Life
If you're hungry for finally some good country music again, here it is. It's nice to hear the dobro and and the banjo in mainstream music again, however, they don't put you not sleep, no... By far the best album I've bought recently.

Brad Paisley - Mud on the Tires
My all time favorite album, what can I say. I consider this to be the epitome of Brad's career so far, even with "Time Well Wasted" out, which is a pretty good album itself. I've pretty much listened every day since it came out. No kidding.

Keith Urban - Golden Road
Another great album. Keith finally realizes his potential he all knew he had. His guitar tone is phenomonal and his band actually compares with him on this record. If you want some toe-tapping, ear grabbing telecaster, this is the CD for you.

Chris Rice - Short Term Memories
Chris Rice's greatest hits. He's somewhat of a "who" Christian music artist who certainly deserves much better. He's the most creative songwriter, and his hits include, "The Other Side of the Radio," and "Cartoons." The music quality is far and above most Christian artists, you can tell he works hard on his sound.

John Mayer - Room for Squares
I don't listen to much pop/rock, but this guy has me hooked. His creative lyrics are what pique my interest the most, but seeing him live is something else altogether. He's an excellent guitar player too. My favorite tracks include "8x5" and "My Stupid Mouth."

Sara Evans - Restless
This album is pure country, so beware. But, if it's what you like, it's an awesome album. Hits include "Suds in the Bucket" and "Perfect."

Sara Groves - All Right Here
I have all her albums. Her songwriting makes you pay attention for sure, but her voice! There is something ethereal, something angelic, about her voice. Anytime I'm stressed, tired, or just plain in the mood I play one of her albums. Not all of her tracks are slow, however, she includes something for every ear.

Nicole Nordeman - Brave
Just another great album from Nicole. Up to par with her "Woven and Spun" and "This Mystery" albums. Funny, she includes a re-make of the Paul McCartney single, "Serve Somebody" and does a pretty awesome job. Good fun, upbeat album for the most part.

VIDEO
Coming soon...

Video of Bruiser, the current largest Tesla Coil in the World. This coil is owned by DC Cox and is currently throwing 26’+ arcs. You may have seen it; it was featured on the television show Mind Freak. However, the arcs on the TV show were at low power.
LINK

Video of Steve Ward’s DRSSTC II, the world record holder for the longest DRSSTC spark. I believe that this is at DC Cox's Cheesehead Teslathon…
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Video of Steve Connor’s OLTC II
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Video of a SSTC audio-modulated organ.
LINK