Plasma Balls

These are, without a doubt - one of the coolest devices out there. Here we cover the technology, DIY plasma balls, where to buy with pics and links of many types including the large 8" balls, the king of plasma (Lumisource) and their unusual plasma devices - and where to get the Professional Plasma balls (if you are independently wealthy). Scroll down past the tech section, if you just want to view and select a great ball to buy !!

Remember these from Spencer's Gifts ?? They're so cool, that I ended up collecting them - the technology and the various colors produced by certain gases is amazing.

The maker of the most famous plasma ball . . . Eye of the Storm, is out of business. Radio Shack followed with a great ball called "Illuma Storm", but only carried it for a couple of years:

Then came the king of plasma balls . . . the Neosphere 9 inch !! But now - it is virtually impossible to find the best balls, called "Neosphere" - in the larger, 6.5" and 9" balls anymore. New vendors have sprung up, but you are limited to low power, 8" balls max. The only large, 12" and up balls are $700 to $10,000 !!!

The Plasma Ball . . . one of the most fascinating items in the world. The science behind it is incredibly bizarre - yet, even if you throw all that out the window, people are transfixed when they see one of these beauties. Regardless of the how and why !! And they are all fascinating and gorgeous - even the cheapies.

That led to other plasma work on items such as the new, flat, Luminglas. And of course . . . the inevitable Case Mods that followed. This guy put a plasma ball in the top of his case, and another guy did

The Best !! Neosphere 4" Mushroom (i.e. "The Brain")
mounted into the top panel of my own clear Acrylic PC

When you look at a plasma ball, you are seeing a miniature lightning storm that runs from the center electrode to the glass. These are IGDT's (Inert Gas Discharge Tubes). They are filled with gas, as opposed to a CRT (Cathode Ray Tube) which is kept at a low pressure inside. You can, however, make a temporary plasma ball at 1 ATM (750 Torr) - see

The "emitter" (center electrode)
emitting a Single Stream of Electrical Energy
through the Plasma (Inert Gases)

The neck of a Plasma Globe
after evacuation, filling, and sealing
("Hermetically Sealed" of course - hehe)

*** if you have the time and are willing to go through a lot of trial and error, you can make your own. This is EXTREMELY difficult - actually impossible if you want to fill the globe yourself !!! So you must have a professional company do that for you (Strattman is the only one I know of that does this as a service).

References (IMPORTANT since the directions here are very basic and not nearly enough to actually make a Plasma Ball):

1) obtain a globe - one of the most difficult challenges is finding a globe !! Here is a source for a 12" clear globe, with electrode - for an amazingly low $30 :

2) Have a professional evacuate (Vacuum) the globe, and fill it with an Inert gas, set the pressure inside (the amount of pressure may vary widely, Strattman told me they use 1 ATM, which is 750 Torr !!), and seal the tube shut .

4) buy a driver (recommended) - basically, there are only two drivers available and only Amazing1 sells both. The smaller PVM12 runs off a AC-DC wall socket converter, and will only power a 12" or 14" globe. However, you will get a brighter display with the 12-inch ball, if you use the 150w driver !!! Of course that's gonna cost you quite a bit more, too.

or build a small Tesla coil to drive the Plasma Ball - it must be a high frequency/high voltage, AC power source. You can buy handheld Tesla coils from many places including

5) build a housing - make one such that the power circuit board sits inside, and the plasma globe sits on top. Feed the tesla probe into the hollow electrode of the globe, making sure it goes all the way to the end and is situated inside the small spherical end of the tube.

Here a very interesting project, where a guy took a huge glass mold of an Einstein bust, and filled it with several different gases to see the effects. See his page

Here's the rub, folks. As with anything, the bigger and brighter . . . the better . . . and the more expensive. In this case, incredibly expensive !!! Actually, these babies are very reasonably priced for the small and even medium sizes (3" up to 8"). The commercial balls for the masses use fairly low voltages (enough to razz you but not injure you, and not enough to wreck your computer).

But when you go to the next size, of 12", the price takes a gigantic leap upwards of $400 tp $700. What happens, is that the glass blowers charge a fortune for 12" balls (6" radius, which is the distance from the electrode to the glass) - I have no idea why. In addition, the 6" radius requires a much higher voltage to suck the lightning from the electrode and have it splat into the glass - than the 8" balls do.

What we need is for someone to build and market a compromise - say, a 10" ball with high voltage of 10 kV. Now that would rock, and could be had for about 300 bucks.

These don't sound that big, at just 8" to 9" - but even a 6-inch globe looks amazingly large when you actually receive and unbox it.

All are around $35 to $40 except the hard-to-find Neosphere (we list 2 places to buy), which is $90

Neosphere (a green "Neon" ring and a plasma "Sphere" . . . Neosphere !!) - the orange ball - these look fantastic - the design is excellent !! I love "the brain" shown below:

These come in 4 models, the 2 largest sizes are next to impossible to find. I finally found a link that claims to sell them but it took me 2 months of searching !!

A small factory in china makes the NeoSphere Balls. There are only a few companies that import them into the US though. They're still in business, but they don't seem to make the bigger balls anymore. Since early 2005, the importers can only get the 4" round and mushroom balls. Fortunately there are still 2 vendors selling the 9" ball !!!

Please email me if you ever find a place to buy either of these. I have tried for a year to get one of these. I have found 3 sites that list it for sale. BUT here are the results:

only one would will reply to emails asking if they carry it !! Can anyone get these sites to respond?

Nebula Ball - the Red ball - also called "Sunder Ball", or just "Plasma Ball"

This is the most common of all plasma balls, and is called many things by the vendors. If the images are not doctored, then this appears to be the busiest ball as well. Just look at the amount of action going on. The Nebula can be identifies by the base - it has an angled sliver removed from each of the 4 sides. These come in 3 models, and are available. It comes with a shroud (tinted plastic) so that you can see the rays during the daytime. That shroud makes alot of the images on the web look dark and lousy.

Sunder Balls - no need to picture these because they are basically the same thing as Nebula Balls, except they have sound activation, and will therefore light up in beat to your music. However, the original ad for these is rather nostalgic:

Plasma 360 - the purple ball - #1 Winner (based only on pics as I do not own one) - this unit comes in one size only. Luckily it is the large, 8" size. Unlike most other Plasma Balls, this one apparently has blue lightning instead of the white and orange

See their Electra line of plasma devices !!! To buy, search Google or eBay, or go to ASC Designs, who carries most of their line of plasma products and constantly sells them on eBay as well. For the best prices - see the

Lumisource makes 90% of those odd-shaped plasma devices out there. You can't call them plasma balls because they are not balls. They do not sell directly to individuals, but their products are everywhere, and they have a distributor link page.

Unfortunately, my favorite Lumisource product of all . . . the single, multicolored, large mushroom - is being discontinued. The dual-mushrooms also rock, and I own a set of those - they come in standard (large) side and mini. But the killer plasma product of all time - that unbelievable mushroom - is gonna be GONE !!! At the time of this writing Nov, 2005 - you might still be able to get them from

It's a mystery - how the heck do they do it? These are a specialty of Lumisource but are also made by several other manufacturers.

If the colors were separated by height then I can understand - different gases have different densities. But they are separated sideways, or diagonally in some cases. An interior wall? But then you would see a sudden, sharp division, and these colors "meld" together.

Frozen CPU's Plasma Ball - comes with with CCFL Ring in the base available at

- runs on either 8 AA batteries or AC adapter - the Base Supplies power, will not see any plasma action when mug is lifted away from the base

Be careful here. Most of the battery powered units take 4, AA batteries. Well, 4 x 1.5v = 6 v. Therefore they are not really made for computers, which offer 12v sources. You are better off buying an AC unit with a 120v AC to 12 vDC adapter, clip the leads, and there you have a 12 vDC Plasma Ball !!

Now, these are exciting !! One unique feature of most of these, is that they use an external driver unit and the plasma globes are connected to the power units by long, low voltage/high current wires. The base of the plasma ball receives the low voltage and uses a step-up transformer to create the high voltages that are necessary. So, the power supply control units can be located up to 100' from the globes (if you had a long enough cable). making installation very flexible.

These are the really big, really clear, extremely bright, and very very very expensive balls !! The price is why only museums have these (except for a few extreme collectors such as myself - and I am the proud owner of a 12" plasma ball !!):

So if you buy a 12" globe from them, it would cost MUCH LESS to get the 30W driver from Amazing1. However, although I have not been able to test this - and it seems likely that you will get a brighter display with the 12-inch ball, if you use the 150w driver !!! Of course that's gonna cost you quite a bit more, too.

They both list a 15-inch diameter plasma ball for $238, and they say "15" Diameter", not the old trick of 15" where the 15" means "Height, including the base". I emailed them for assurance on the size. Is this possible??? If so I want one right away !! That 15-inch ball is listed at only about 20% the prices of all other 12" balls !!! Hmm, better research this. They list their SKU number as "3599SL" and they list the "manufacturer's SKU" as "15PlasmaBall". Searching on Google, about 5 other sites list the same ball - only 1 other site still exists: http://www.animationbz.com/3599.html

This is a flat circle (about 1/2" thick, so there is space for the gas), filled with plasma producing gases. Very cool !! Except for the discontinued 12" version . . . more on that later . . .

The 6" Luminglas is a series of opaque beads suspended in a tiny amount of plasma gas. It is very inexpensive, but looks great. The electrical action is very bright. One thing I do not like is that all sparks emanate from the center - it would be nice to have them occur randomly all over the place.

12" Blue Luminglas ($90)
(FAKE PIC !! - see below)

12" and 16" models use a surface that looks like sandy concrete when off, and not much better when on. I do NOT like the large Lumindisks - more on this below !!

12" Green Luminglas
(unavailable)

12" and 16" models use a surface that looks like sandy concrete when off, and not much better when on. I do NOT like the large Lumindisks - more on this below!!

6" Luminglas comes in Blue, Green, Megenta, Sunburst, Rainbow, and White.

eParty - wide colors selection ($30)

ThinkGeek - several colors ($23)

Geeks.com - limited selection ($25)

The surface is high-quality opaque beads instead of the sandy concrete of the large models. These are very bright and very active.

Pocket Luminglas
Only 2 1/4" in diamater. ($25)

NOTE: you can often find the "discontinued" items on eBay !!

Cheapest at StarMagic.com or Spencer's Gifts ($20)
Pocket Luminglas (aka "Clip-On Luminglas") - also try eBay !!!!!
available in Green, Blue, Rainbow, or White
2 1/4" diamater. ($25)

In the first place, they don't make these anymore. I thought it was such a shame and set out to find one. Finally I found a vendor who had just 1 left, and I snapped it up.

What a disappointment !!! Unlike the pics on the Internet (and I reviewed many pics of it), it is not see-through at all, and instead has a sandy, off-white covering on it. No Blue. I thought this would be like a clear disk, with Blue lightning. Instead it is a sand-covered disk. Also the lightning is supposed to be blue but it is white. As to the Box it comes in - even that is an outrageous lie !! The pic on the Box shows it as Blue - but it is white, just like the newer 6" Luminglas. Here is the picture I took - you can see what I am talking about. A classic example of false advertising:


Neosphere "Brain" (Mushroom)	Neosphere 4"	Neosphere 6.5"	Neosphere 9"


Portable Plasma Ball (bottom half is covered)	Coiled Cobra Plasma Ball	"The Claw" Plasma Ball	Plasma Light Bulb (only $9 )

Globe diameter	Refilling Price
12"	$165.00
14"	$220.00
18"	$275.00
22"	$330.00
24"	$400.00
30"	$600.00

	Plasma Balls and Lamps * the most detailed Plasma page on the Web *
12" Plasma Ball in Action
Play Video1 (normal operation) Play Video2 (zoom in)


Nebula Ball turned Off	Unshrouded Nebula Balls - 3 sizes	Shrouded Nebula Ball


Vendor's Doctored Picture	Actual Picture (wow !!)


Manufacturer's Pic	Single Mushroom "in Action"

Colors and Effects of Various Gases