Hello!
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Jacob_Minnich
- Posts: 1
- Joined: Sat Mar 18, 2017 8:10 pm
- Real name: Jacob Minnich
Hello!
My name is Jacob. I am a student at the Pennsylvania State University, looking to build a research grade demo fusor as a summer project, using money from a grant that one of my professors has from the NSF.
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David Kunkle
- Posts: 284
- Joined: Thu Apr 17, 2014 12:43 pm
- Real name: David Kunkle
Re: Hello!
Welcome. Not many people show up here with government grant money. Just wondering what kind of spending limits you have? Most fusor parts around here are scrounged, and working assemblies wind up costing hundreds to a few thousands. Recalling past talk about how a system put together by "pros" (aka grant money) can easily spend $50,000 or more to get one working.
If your experiment needs statistics, you ought to have done a better experiment.
Ernest Rutherford
Ernest Rutherford
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Richard Hull
- Moderator
- Posts: 15023
- Joined: Fri Jun 15, 2001 9:44 am
- Real name: Richard Hull
Re: Hello!
Grant money tends to get spent like rainwater running off a tin roof. Once the money is in the bank, spending of the agency, college or institutuion goes nuts. Often material that is not absolutely necessary to the project is purchased long before any demonstrable or possible immediate need for it exists. In short, the project blooms and blossoms rapidly surrounding itself in superfluous gear and, often, personnel. In military terms, there is a lack of "fire discipline. Frequently, before the project gets near completeion more money is requested, having exhausted the original sum foolishly.
Amateurs would be, typicalaly, forced to plan carefully and use what minimal funds are at hand for only the most critical components in an orderly fashion. We have observed that this is not always the case in amateur efforts. A few go "hog wild" at the effort throwing caution to the wind. They typically blast into the project, expend a good deal of money, hit a stopping point and simply fail. This is almost always the case with the most youthful applicants. Youth wants what it wants right now. If the effort involves struggle on a continuous basis over any sort of perceived "long haul", they typically demur at some point.
So we wind up with hampered grant situations often running out of funds and youthful exuberance running out of steam.
A win at this demands a lot of self-directed study, planning over an extended period and a verve directed at getting the task done.
Richard Hull
Amateurs would be, typicalaly, forced to plan carefully and use what minimal funds are at hand for only the most critical components in an orderly fashion. We have observed that this is not always the case in amateur efforts. A few go "hog wild" at the effort throwing caution to the wind. They typically blast into the project, expend a good deal of money, hit a stopping point and simply fail. This is almost always the case with the most youthful applicants. Youth wants what it wants right now. If the effort involves struggle on a continuous basis over any sort of perceived "long haul", they typically demur at some point.
So we wind up with hampered grant situations often running out of funds and youthful exuberance running out of steam.
A win at this demands a lot of self-directed study, planning over an extended period and a verve directed at getting the task done.
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
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