Anybody have an Idea how they are generating a Plasma Ring with this contraption?

This forum is for other possible methods for fusion such as Sonolumenescense, Cold Fusion, CANR/LENR or accelerator fusion. It should contain all theory, discussions and even construction and URLs related to "other than fusor, fusion".
Post Reply
User avatar
Mike Beauford
Posts: 419
Joined: Wed Apr 25, 2007 2:24 pm
Real name:
Location: Morton Grove, IL

Anybody have an Idea how they are generating a Plasma Ring with this contraption?

Post by Mike Beauford »

Mike Beauford
User avatar
Chris Bradley
Posts: 2930
Joined: Fri May 02, 2008 7:05 am
Real name:

Re: Anybody have an Idea how they are generating a Plasma Ring with this contraption?

Post by Chris Bradley »

This was proposed some years back by another company who I seem to recall also successfully formed toroidal plasmas in air and got photos of them.

The 'missing link' here is so basic as to be barely worth mentioning - what is the connection with 'energy' and why is this research 'vital to compete in energy research'?

'Fraid it's looking like science is tending back to the flash-bang-wallop approach where anything that glows is labelled 'fusion research'. Just because it is from a University, I don't see much difference to this compared with other examples of people mistakenly connecting any-old-plasma flash with 'fusion energy' (e.g. Solomon Azar, Christopher Strevens, Javier Lopez)

I suspect it is simply a rapid discharge from a carefully aligned central electrode to an outer electrode (with one open and one closed end, so it is electrostatically ejected), within a 'seed' magnetic field. Claims of having put several kJ into the plasma itself would need to be examined more closely.
User avatar
Richard Hull
Moderator
Posts: 14992
Joined: Fri Jun 15, 2001 9:44 am
Real name: Richard Hull

Re: Anybody have an Idea how they are generating a Plasma Ring with this contraption?

Post by Richard Hull »

I am familiar with kilojoule discharges and the one in the color video is not one. A demo perhaps of a few hundred joules. Regarding the slow motion B&W discharge with the ring of plasma, I can't tell as I can't see the cabling.

Richard Hull
Progress may have been a good thing once, but it just went on too long. - Yogi Berra
Fusion is the energy of the future....and it always will be
The more complex the idea put forward by the poor amateur, the more likely it will never see embodiment
User avatar
Steven Sesselmann
Posts: 2127
Joined: Wed Aug 10, 2005 9:50 pm
Real name: Steven Sesselmann
Location: Sydney - Australia
Contact:

Re: Anybody have an Idea how they are generating a Plasma Ring with this contraption?

Post by Steven Sesselmann »

Mike,

Thanks for posting, any kind of plasma ball in air is an interesting phenomenon.

If my way of thinking is right, it is not simply a matter of making a high voltage discharge, plasmas are hot, and will have a natural tendency to spread out, the electrical charges are assumed to be balanced, when the plasma discharge is happening at ground potential, so it is the heat that destroys the confinement.

The trick in my opinion is to generate the atmospheric plasma discharge at a potential below ground potential, something we fusioneeers certainly know how to do. The discharge generated inside a faraday cage charged to a low potential, and then immediately ejected from the potential well while still hot.

Such a plasma should tend to be self confined until charge leaks into the atmosphere and it becomes neutral, at which time it will fall apart.

I imagine a Faraday cage open on one side, I suppose even a capped pipe will do, mounted on an insulator and connected to source of negative bias, on the inside, having two electrodes insulated from the cage, capable of creating a plasma, an electric arc welder may do the job, but the whole unit would have to float (a trivial engineering problem).

Okay, so now we create a plasma at negative potential, and then somehow, we need to eject the plasma ball from the Faraday cage, possibly by giving the Faraday cage a sudden drop in potential, so the negatively charged plasma is expelled.

Armchair physics for sure, but an experiment fully within the capabilities of most guys here.

Steven

Gamma Spectacular
http://www.gammaspectacular.com - Gamma Spectrometry Systems
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Steven_Sesselmann - Various papers and patents on RG
Frank Sanns
Site Admin
Posts: 2119
Joined: Fri Jun 14, 2002 2:26 pm
Real name: Frank Sanns

Re: Anybody have an Idea how they are generating a Plasma Ring with this contraption?

Post by Frank Sanns »

The easiest way to launch plasma is to eject with an electromagnetic field. This is accomplished by having a coil of wire under a heavy duty spark gap. A capacitor is attached through the coil at one electrode and the other electrode to the other lead of the capacitor. The voltage is ramped up on the capacitor until the air gap between the electrodes breaks down causing an arc. As the current peaks with the discharge, so does the magnetic field of the coil and repulsion will result and the plasma will launch quite some distance in air. It is short lived and has nothing to do with storing energy or sustaining plasma in air. All the energy of the coil and the arc dissipates quickly into heat of the surroundings.

Frank Sanns
Achiever's madness; when enough is still not enough. ---FS
We have to stop looking at the world through our physical eyes. The universe is NOT what we see. It is the quantum world that is real. The rest is just an electron illusion. ---FS
Edward Miller
Posts: 266
Joined: Wed Mar 19, 2003 3:50 am
Real name: Edward Miller
Contact:

Re: Anybody have an Idea how they are generating a Plasma Ring with this contraption?

Post by Edward Miller »

Here's a link to the paper. http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp. ... er=6383278

Summary... "A multi-millisecond duration, exploding wire air plasma with electron density of at least 1014 /cm3 has been developed and is presented in this study. Confining the radial expansion of an exploding wire discharge has resulted in interesting magnetohydrodynamic effects, producing a toroidal air plasma, or TAP."
kcdodd
Posts: 28
Joined: Thu Sep 20, 2012 12:29 am
Real name:

Re: Anybody have an Idea how they are generating a Plasma Ring with this contraption?

Post by kcdodd »

It looks like a normal air vortex to me.
User avatar
Mike Beauford
Posts: 419
Joined: Wed Apr 25, 2007 2:24 pm
Real name:
Location: Morton Grove, IL

Re: Anybody have an Idea how they are generating a Plasma Ring with this contraption?

Post by Mike Beauford »

Thanks for explaining it.

p.s. - I hate it when they hide papers behind pay walls!
Mike Beauford
terryphi
Posts: 21
Joined: Fri Nov 09, 2012 1:08 pm
Real name:

Re: Anybody have an Idea how they are generating a Plasma Ring with this contraption?

Post by terryphi »

Los Alamos had a project that used these - the name escapes me - it's the reactor that General Fusion is basing their design off of.

The shoot toroidal 'plasmoids' into a lead-lithium liquid blanket, then collapse the blanket. The blanket collapses faster than the electric fields can permeate through it.

From what I heard, the plasmoids are stable for several milliseconds.
Post Reply

Return to “Other Forms of Fusion - Theory, Construction, Discussion, URLs”