Putting Things Together

[Charles Vorbach]

So I'm getting closer to first plasma. I have my voltmeter up and will have a ammeter in the next few weeks. I just need to put a few components under oil, hook up the pump, and make some kind of high voltage feedthrough.

I got two CF blanks that were pretty dirty and blacked on the inside with something. I was sure I was going to have to return them, but I gave cleaning them a shot anyway.

Whatever the substance was, it came off nicely with soap and water. It could be arsenic for all I know so I threw out the sponges.

One is still scuffed up, although the knife edges look fine. Does anyone know if it will be alright?

[prestonbarrows]

Conflat knife edges are very forgiving of damage if you use elastomer gaskets. If the edge gets dinged up enough to not make a good metal-to-metal seal, you can get special metal gaskets sized to seal on the tapered face rather than the edge itself. In the worst cases, you can resort to things like indium wire gaskets.

Yours look just fine, especially for fusor levels of vacuum.

[Charles Vorbach]

Thanks!