Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!iscuva!jimc
From: jimc@iscuva.ISCS.COM (Jim Cathey)
Newsgroups: sci.electronics
Subject: Re: Bug-Zapper
Message-ID: <1750@iscuva.ISCS.COM>
Date: 14 Jul 88 15:49:29 GMT
References: <3118@ihlpe.ATT.COM> <1743@vaxb.calgary.UUCP>
Organization: ISC Systems Corporation, Spokane, WA
Lines: 28

In article <3118@ihlpe.ATT.COM>, jph@ihlpe.ATT.COM (452is-Hayes) writes:
> How can you make a homemade electric/electronic bug-zapper?  Looking
> for something fairly uncomplicated.  Can it be something as simple as sections 
> of a grid each hooked to the 2 different plates of a sizeable electrolytic 
> charged sufficiently so that when a bug bridges the grid it gets
> zapped by the cap's discharge thru its body and then re-charges? 
> Or is there more to it than that?

I suspect that that wouldn't work for more than the first bug.  I think
the commercial units use a heavy-duty step-up transformer to provide a
lot of power to the grid (something like a neon light transformer or an
oil burner ignition transformer).  This is to burn away the dead bug's
body.  A lightweight capacitor probably won't store enough energy to
both kill the bug and burn it away if it should stick.  For sure the
trickle charger you were talking about couldn't burn the bug off.  By
the way I don't think you can get an electrolytic cap that would be
suitable.  A better bet would be a HV capacitor charged to an extremely
high voltage.  I've seen some Leyden jar demos using a Van de Graff
generator for charging that would do a nice number on a bug!

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