Electric OU: Tar Baby is in Good Health
After our recent mishap last week when I was trying to use the Ainslie component destroyer to drive my new Tesla coil resonator…. some people have been worried about their favorite little briar patch critter. After all, it was quite the spectacular event. Even though I had a 10 amp fuse inline at the battery positive terminal, we still had a wonderful power arc event that literally exploded two mosfets, catching them on fire. Two others shattered from heat stress and the final one simply shorted drain-source, without visible external damage. Also blew the 0.2 ohm CVR on the Tar Baby motherboard…. and of course, the final output stage of my precious antique Interstate F43 function generator. (Antique NOS Motorola final output transistors coming from Singapore, all other FG functions check out good, so we will be back online with the F43 soon.) Well, the reports of her demise are clearly premature, for Tar Baby, after some minor surgery and transplants, is as good as new. Even better than new, actually, because it seems that fewer Q2 mosfets results in more strongly negative mean power products. Who knew? (I did… and I’ll bet some others did too.)
