Why is it necessary to scrupulously dry D2 gas before using it in a Fusor? I don't get it; why should a small quantity of D2O poison the Fusor? The D2O should just be ionized and broken up, and the end result would be a small quantity of Oxygen ions flying around. Please explain, if you can.
Sven
Why necessary to dry D2 gas?
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Sven Andersson
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John Futter
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Re: Why necessary to dry D2 gas?
Sven
The water molecule is polar and it sticks to everything inside.
It also has a vapour pressure of much higher than required in a running fusor thus diluting your D2.
If ionised the water molecule breaks up into d+ and 0- ions the o- is much more likely to react with a d+ ion than two d atoms fusing-- aginaspoiler for fusion
The water molecule is polar and it sticks to everything inside.
It also has a vapour pressure of much higher than required in a running fusor thus diluting your D2.
If ionised the water molecule breaks up into d+ and 0- ions the o- is much more likely to react with a d+ ion than two d atoms fusing-- aginaspoiler for fusion
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prestonbarrows
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Re: Why necessary to dry D2 gas?
Water adheres to surfaces and requires a lot of energy to pull off again. In a high vacuum system, this means that water tends to stick around for a long time and raises your baseline pressure. If half the nuclei bouncing around aren't deuterium, it is pretty clear the number of reactions happening will be greatly reduced also.
When you start talking about plasma environments, some of that left over water will become ionized and/or dissociated. This means you have big heavy ions of H2O, D2O, HO, DO, O2 etc. flying around. These draw current from your power supply but do not really contribute to the reactions you want; heavy ions do not move very fast and tend to cool things down.
Heavy ions also tend to sputter off other contaminates from surfaces when they impact. This can lead to run away conditions and weird oscillations or arcing.
So in broad strokes,
1) non-deuterium nuclei don't fuse
2) non-deuterium nuclei leech power and cool down the deuterium nuclei
3) non-deuterium nuclei further stir up contaminates
You don't need to have perfectly dry D2 input, but it will make things much easier if you do.
When you start talking about plasma environments, some of that left over water will become ionized and/or dissociated. This means you have big heavy ions of H2O, D2O, HO, DO, O2 etc. flying around. These draw current from your power supply but do not really contribute to the reactions you want; heavy ions do not move very fast and tend to cool things down.
Heavy ions also tend to sputter off other contaminates from surfaces when they impact. This can lead to run away conditions and weird oscillations or arcing.
So in broad strokes,
1) non-deuterium nuclei don't fuse
2) non-deuterium nuclei leech power and cool down the deuterium nuclei
3) non-deuterium nuclei further stir up contaminates
You don't need to have perfectly dry D2 input, but it will make things much easier if you do.
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Richard Hull
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Re: Why necessary to dry D2 gas?
There is the tacit assumption here that you are talking about electrolyzed D20 and its need for drying of the deuterium gas given off. Some newbies might not understand drying only applies to electrolyzed heavy water.
Tanked Deuterium doesn't have this problem.
RichArd Hull
Tanked Deuterium doesn't have this problem.
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