Yeah, the charge all winds up on the outside surface anyway. And the time required for that to happen (charge relaxation time) if short compared to any other aspect of the physics of the situation (like 10^-16 seconds or something within an order of magnitude or two fo that).

 

A charge on a large sphere will develop a lower voltage than a charge on a small sphere, whether it is a pulse or DC. A filament or pointed antennae will produce a higher voltage for the same charge than a round antennae of fat conductor.

 

I am interested in an impulse build up of stationery charge, to generate a momentary Electromagnetic pulse. I am not looking to form a plasma between contacts and pass a current through it, I am looking to create an ionized atmosphere around the source of EM pulse and separate the ions into negative and positive charges, using magnetic fields.

Edited May 18, 20178 yr by Handy andy

i do not know if any one else got a copy of electron physics by J Thompson and E Callick. I keep going back to section 5.3, the book is very dated, but to paraphrase a quote by prof Townsend " current due to ionization by electron collision could become mathematically infinite, if it were assumed the positive ions were capable of ionization by collision also"

 

Photo emissions are responsible for secondary ionization producing currents beyond what can be explained by the avalanche effect, this may be potentially self sustaining, if the charges are handled and separated accordingly, via modulating magnetic fields through the ionized gases.