I haven't seen this done yet, so I wanted to give it a try:

MB_Plasma_Balls.JPG

These are small 12V Plasma Balls and I'm using a DKPinball 12V Fused Power Tap. They run continuously and I lowered the 906 socket height so that I could squeeze a comet 8SMD flex flasher below the plasma balls.

It looks cool as hell...EXCEPT....if you look closely at the picture, two of the SMDs on the flashers are continuously lit. The plasma ball is backfeeding current into the flashers! I knew that plasma balls feed tiny amounts of current (at a high voltage) into whatever touches the ball....but I didn't think it was enough to light 2 SMDs!

I turned the machine off after a minute or two as I didn't want to push my luck. I like the flexes under the balls, so I may try moving them out a bit and see if I can stop the backfeeding.

If anyone else has given this a try, let me know if you have had any long term issues...not sure if I'm comfortable leaving it as is....

It's continuous as it's just feeding off of the power tap. I unplugged the flashers entirely and the SMDs are still lighting up - so I guess that negates my theory about backfeed. Maybe the plasma balls are kicking out enough UV to make the phosphors in the flashers glow?

And another issue - after about 30 minutes being on, I detected a pretty strong smell. I at first thought it was the power tap overheating, but I switched them over to a separate 12v power supply and the smell remained. I figured out it's actually coming from the balls themselves - I guess these things can generate ozone by ionizing the air around them. Weird.

Yea - I took the figures out to have them painted and I'm replacing the rubbers with Titan colored ones. The plasma balls aren't mounted in the picture above either - I was just placing them in their approximate spots to get an idea.

The plasma balls are on ebay here:

ebay.com link: itm