New SoCal Effort

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Joe Gayo
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New SoCal Effort

Post by Joe Gayo »

Hello everyone,

I’m an engineer in Southern California working on a neutron producing fusor. The device is the ultra-compact variety using KF40 fittings and a Pfeiffer Duo 2.5 pump (only, no diffusion or turbo).

Regards, Joe
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Dennis P Brown
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Re: New SoCal Effort

Post by Dennis P Brown »

Welcome. Good luck with your efforts in building a fusor. I'm not aware of a successful fusor that uses only a mechanical pump. Others will likely have more knowledge and comment on this issue.
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Joe Gayo
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Re: New SoCal Effort

Post by Joe Gayo »

I found this while searching fusor.net -
"Pressure is still 48-58 mTorr during runs. Base pressure has lowered to 3 mTorr (I'm using just a 2-stage rotary pump)."
viewtopic.php?f=18&t=11318&start=25

So it has been done before ...
John Futter
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Re: New SoCal Effort

Post by John Futter »

Joe
What makes you think that Garret only used a mechanical pump
yes the operating point is above the lowest pressure that a mechanical pump can achieve but the pumping speed is almost zero.
you need vacuums before you start of 10^-5 torr or better to remove as much crud especially water vapor from the system otherwise yo will dilute your gas by as much as 80%
please do a lot more reading
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Richard Hull
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Re: New SoCal Effort

Post by Richard Hull »

10e-4 torr is just fine for most fusor run starts, but the deeper you go, the better and more rapid your results. Running pressures as you admit flowing D2 into the chamber against the ultimate low pressure is 5-25 millitorr.

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
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Joe Gayo
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Re: New SoCal Effort

Post by Joe Gayo »

John Futter,

I found the pictures of the device you have presumably at GNS:

viewtopic.php?f=18&t=9534

Did you ever run D2 with a Ti target? Just curious.
John Futter
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Re: New SoCal Effort

Post by John Futter »

No
I was not allowed to ie no good reason to produce ionising radiation
Although If I wanted to do it over a weekend with another staff member on hand to satisfy safety concerns I probably could. 'Recently I have been running high power carbon beams (Butane gas) in the ion source and ion currents of around 20mA to do DLC coatings, DLC = diamond like coating

I can get 1-2 microns per hour coating thickness of DLC over a 6"diameter so it is quite quick
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Dennis P Brown
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Re: New SoCal Effort

Post by Dennis P Brown »

Diamond like films - interesting. A few coworkers some years ago grew actual diamond films; they impregnated the surface of a copper plate with diamond dust and then use a method very similar to yours.
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