coil gun coils...

[FishBoy]

Hey guys, quick question. I'm making a small coil gun with a capacitor bank I made with 4 camera caps in parallel. The thing I'm not sure about is, should the wires of the coil be insulated or un-insulated?

Note- Yes, I no this will not be very powerfull, you don't need to tell me.

[Ragnarok]

They HAVE to be insulated, or the coil will be utterly useless.
Use enamelled magnet (might also be known as coil or solenoid) wire - 20 SWG is usually a good bet.

[TurboSuper]

Yeah, just scrape the insulation (enamel) off the ends so you can solder them.

[jimmy101]

A good source of wire is an old motor or transformer.

If the wire is a shiny copper color it probably is insulated. If it wasn't coated with something the copper would have corroded to the brownish/green of old copper pipe.

Radioshack has this set for $6;

http://www.radioshack.com/product/index ... Id=2036277


You can burn the insulation off the end with a match. I find it works better than scraping.

[MaxuS the 2nd]

Just buy a roll of enamelled copper wire.

The wire on old motors or transformers is usually glued together to ensure that it doesn't unravel.

If the wire weren't insulated, you'd just have a rather hefty join in the circuit..