SpudFiles

I was using a BBQ sparker that had 2 wires coming out of. And when you put the wires really close together and click, it sparks.
Well, that one sorta broke so I got another BBQ sparker, but this one had only 1 wire coming out of it. o.O
And it seems like the other end is basically grounding, which seems to make sense at first but, it will spark to bicycle handle, and bikes are not exactly grounded, due to rubber tires.
So... I'm not exactly sure how it works.
And does it only spark if the other end is large enough to receive the spark?
?????

Does the bike have a kickstand? that would explain it sparking to the bike And yeah i think the other end is a ground if u r gonna use it id hook up the ground. and what do you mean if the other end is large enogh to recive a spark?

those types need modification I believe.
I'm not sure but they sound like something I need to look into sounds fun to play with/

Well, I don't remember if the bike had the kick stand proped up against the ground or not, but I do know that you could use a person as the connection to ground even though the person may be wearing shoes (completely non-conduction material such as rubber flipflops), which lead me to believe that as long as the receiving end can work like a capacitor, the spark will go through.
But I still am not sure.

And I guess I wouldn't be having all these problem if I somehow managed to secure the bbq lighter and it's wiring because lets face it, the wires are about 1.5 mm in diameter and break easily from repeated bending.
Any ideas on how I might be able to secure it if I've got approximately a foot of it?

You could put better wires on it... You could just add more wire onto the end of the original wire to get more length and have more to work with.

"Grounding" has nothing to do with this, much less a kickstand.... :p


The BBQ sparker has two terminals - one is a little metal tab on the side of the unit, and the other is the metal tip at the very bottom. Connect a wire to each one (solder if possible). Done.

Peace,
Pete Zaria.

Look on the side of the body, it should have a thin line running from the top down, that line is the ground wire (it's meant to contact the sheet metal of the BBQ it is mounted on) you can wrap a wire around that part as your second electrode.


The best thing to do is try to pick up an igniter intended to work with a sideburner BBQ, has both wire already.

the peizos i buy are exactly the same as what you are describing.

they are an earth, for my findings i found that i had to wrap a new wire around the larger thread just so i could use 2 wires.

on my combustion this did not matter for it would earth thought the metal(it was all metal)

so yea ur not alone on this one.

Be careful trying to solder directly to a piezo sparker. They were not designed for it and the contacts are probably steel and are not tinned and will be hard to get to take solder. A soldering iron can easily heat the pastic case (or internal parts) past their softening temperature.

Tightly wraping new wires may work. You don't need a great electrical contact, heck, the spark'll jump a tiny gap without affecting the performance.

Thats what I meant, you strip about 3" of wire and wrap it around the middle, then tape the shit out of it, the spark jumps the extremely small gap (only a couple thousanths of an inch). And you are right about soldering, that is one big bitch trying to tin those wires, they dont take solder worth a damn, even if you manage to seperate the ground wire from the body, which is possible but tends to make it easier to get damaged.



~Chaos~ Lol man the term is "Ground" not Earth hah. The current doesnt have to go into the ground, it simply needs to return to the opposite charge polarity in the ingiter (the other side of the peizo crystal).

Thanks you guys.
I soldered my first bbq lighter (it had 2 wires coming out of it). It worked fine until the wire broke where the solders are. So I tried to unsolder but wound up ruining the sparker as the plastic sorta.... melted.
That's why I have this new weird lighter.
Well, its wires hasn't broken yet, and I hope it'll stay that way

Spudinator wrote:Thats what I meant, you strip about 3" of wire and wrap it around the middle, then tape the crap out of it, the spark jumps the extremely small gap (only a couple thousanths of an inch). And you are right about soldering, that is one big [female doggy] trying to tin those wires, they dont take solder worth a damn, even if you manage to seperate the ground wire from the body, which is possible but tends to make it easier to get damaged.



~Chaos~ Lol man the term is "Ground" not Earth hah. The current doesnt have to go into the ground, it simply needs to return to the opposite charge polarity in the ingiter (the other side of the peizo crystal).

grr got me there mate, i was actually doing some physics work on electricity when i read this, maybe thats why i mixed it up.

Well I finally got around to taking a few pictures of my carrot gun!
w00t
I think I shall name it Carrotizer




So far I can use either breach load or old-musket-styled loading
And Lysol totally works, but sometimes it can smell a little too strong

whats the watch for?

Blackett wrote:whats the watch for?

probably just to show the proportion of the gun in the picture.