[Corvettaholic]

Got a couple questions on ions. So lets say I have a high voltage circuit, with one of the solder joints being fairly pointy. I know there will be corona here and some high voltage leakage. Now, what exactly IS corona and whats leaking? Free electrons? Atmosphere molecules with electrons stripped off?

Also, if I have a HV incomplete circuit with a pointy tip, will the circuit jump to ground to complete the circuit, blast off ions through the corona, or have nothing happen? This circuit I'm wondering about is kind of like this:

Power source-->transformer-->HV output--->continuous loop around the secondary winding-->tap on the loop that goes to a pointy antenna

I'm not looking for an oscillator to make a radio or anything, I just want to know what that antenna/pointy thing will do. I say pointy because I know pointy is good for playing with HV when you WANT it to leak.