I did not post anything for quite a while, this is something i had in my mind for a year or so.
The attached image shows a new kind of fusor grid (maybe you already had this idea) and a big coil around the outer grid. So, what do you, think why did i put that coil there? ))
I think you are doing the fanning electron beam ionization...... are you going to use 600vac as your driving voltage. I found a tin can will work in the same way, without too much trouble.... the outer grid does not have to be transparent ya know.
If your box is sealed up tight a microwave ionization scheme with the magnetic field of 1.2 mT will cause ionization through out.
That was not quite what i had in mind. This setup is just an idea, what i want is to convert radiant energy direclty into electricity. I dont know too much about nuclear physics, but maybe the ions hitting the coil will induce a current flow. Or if we would be able to force alpha particles into a beam, that would be practically an electric current.Oh and just a small idea (maybe you discussed this too): we could cool the grids if they are hollow, so water could be pumped through, this way we would have some steam too to drive a turbine, but i dont like the old "boil-it" conversion. Another thing: How about using a MHG to get energy from the plasma? Tell me if i am saying stupid things! ) Im 18 years old, and only recently started "working" on this technology. For those who came since i registered, i am a hungarian student, and my name is Adam Szendrey.
Not too silly an idea but hard to implement due to electrons hitting the grid causing the ions to become neutrals with no net flow in your wire. If you go to the Tom Ligon analog (The World's Simplest Fusion Reactor: And How to Make It Work - ) at(http://torsatron.tripod.com/fusor/gfusor.html) article a dirrect conversion scheme
is laid out for the production of electricity by means of
the alpha particles. Flow is created in the outer shell of the device as alphas neutralize against the metal shell
causing it to go positive in charge. The shell creates an electric flow when the charging supply for slowing down the alphas acts as the negative pole and the shell as the positive pole. (huh?) Well when the electrons are sucked out of the shell it becomes more positive than the charging supply. Hence the flow of electrons from the supply to the shell. Nature will balance charge wearever posible. Work can be done between the connection of the shell of the fusor and the vcc+ line of the 1.5 million volt supply.
Adam, in reply to your first post, heres what i think would happen. When the deuterons gained energy from accelerating toward the inner grid, they would start to be influenced by the magnetic field. This would cause them to start to rotate in a circle around the volume of the fusor, in a spiral rotating toward the inner grid. they will collide with other deuterons experiencing the same thing, but they will not collide head on, or even close to head on, they will mostly collide at close to parallel, where the coulomb repulsion would be more than enough to keep them apart. some one else might have a different take on it.
3l, I sort of uderstand the idea of when the ions hit the outer shell they absorb electrons, and make the shell positive. What I don't understand is how you will get energy from this. Say you had a power supply that had a + side and a - side. If you route the + side to the shell, and - side to the inner grid, When ions steal electrons from the shell, and therefor the + line, wont it make the - side more +, meaning something you really dont want?
The way you get power is to get a potential difference between the power plus and the fusor sphere. You can put an electrostatic motor between the power supply and the fusor sphere, it is one of the motor that can work at such high voltages (1.6 MV). The motor will create shaft rotation which if you use a long enough insulative pole to rotate a standard generator armature to create a more normal voltage.
The way you get power is to get a potential difference between the power plus and the fusor sphere. You can put an electrostatic motor between the power supply and the fusor sphere, it is one of the motor that can work at such high voltages (1.6 MV). The motor will create shaft rotation which if you use a long enough insulative pole to rotate a standard generator armature to create a more normal voltage.
Electrostatic motors are quite viable. Large ones, more so in the vacuum of space, while small nano-technology, MEMS electrostatic motors are the defacto standard for micro mechanisms, right now!
I have built a number of electrostatic motors in the past and my favorites are the corona motor and the capacitor motor. I have had a 100 gram rotor wiz up to a speed of 3000 rpm with 10kvdc applied drawing 10-20 ua.(no load, of course).
In outer space, external auxiliary motor insulation would not be a big issue. Space and size are also of little concern (you got a' whole universe to play in)
Doing a bit of math and thinkin' it out, a one horse motor here on earth might weigh about 40-50 lbs, most being copper and steel. The electrical feed wires would have to be at least 12 gauge.
In space a 1 hp electrostatic motor could be about 8 times larger in diameter but only 1" thick and be made of thin plastic. Maybe 6 lbs. One hp @ 30kv would be about a 25ma draw. Thus, you would not have to launch copper and steel or heavy duty #12 wiring for the distribution system. Instead, a small 30 guage aluminum wire could handle the whole one horsepower load.
Interestingly, even a lighter weight carbon fiber conductor with over 1,000 ohms of resistance to the motor cicuit would work fine with only a 0.6 watt loss (.08% loss) in the line under full load. Can't do that with a big ole honky 1 hp magnetic motor.
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
There would be no magnets inside the fusor. No electromagnetic nor permanent magnets. I have been thinking about conducting plasma...Why cant we make "fusor pipes"? Along the pipe the plasma would be contained by inertial electrostatic confinement. Further more if pulsing separate electrodes in a certain alignment this plasma could be circulated. An MHD unit would be somewhere in the loop. I know you dont like magnets , but those darn ions must be diverged so they hit the electrodes inside the MHD. Maybe using superconducting magnets would be the solution..after all that is not hard to achieve. Another solution may be to split up the plasma beam, and "flatten" it. This way the magnetic flux could be "compressed" into a much smaller volume of space, thus radically decreasing the required size of the magnets in the MHD unit. Im continuing this little thinking of mine, maybe i'll come up with something usefull. Oh a little question to all: if i am cooling the electrodes of a fusor, then it can be run for a much longer period of time right? Ofcourse assuming that all the other equipment can take it. I think i will buy very small diameter pipes, and make the electrodes out of that. Pumping through water, or any collant liquid, will carry away most of the heat energy. Maybe even running a small turbine just for fun ). I repeat i really dont like the idea of a "boiling fusor" but it would be nice to see a fusor generate electrical power such a way, it would just be fun nothing more.
Adam
Ps.: I agree, fusion IS fun, now lets make a few gigawatts LOL
The plasma isnt really "confined" by IEC, any more than laser fusion confines the pellet. The ions come and go, some are shooting towards the middle, some are shooting away, and some are just hanging out waiting to be bounced around in the poisseur. The only way to confine it in the true sense of the word is to use magets,and we all know how well thats been working:P Another reason IEC wouldn't work is that the ions would be going back and forth along the pipe, so that a unidirectional flow cannot be obtained which is neccessary for your MHD idea to work. Superconducting magnets are out of the picture as we are amateurs, and have no budget for that. Even if we were millionaires, we probably wouldn't be thinking about that, we would be doing alot more research though..... The problem with the cooled grids by pumpingwater or coolant through is that the coolant will carry away charge from the grid, no matter how good of an insulator it is. Another option to cool the grids is to heatsink them outside he fusor, problem there is that you may run into corona problems with the exposed heat sink (unless it was diamond, but again that might be a little bit expensive, less than superconducting magets though:)
Any significant electrical energy or charge would not be removed from the inner grid via the coolant if the entire coolant system were on an isolated deck. All the pumps, plumbing, reservoir and heat exchanger would be on that deck. This is regardless of whether you used conductive liquid sodium metal or distilled, de-ionized highly insulating water as your coolant. Such systems have been used in the past on super high voltage anode systems in vacuum tubes.
Some hydrogen thyratron circuits are still in service where instantly lethal floating decks are used to allow for cascading in special systems. Engineers and safety officers don't like this, but in some instances it has to be done.
Such complications increase not only the danger, but the cost of the related cooling and or circuitry hardware.
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
So what if the grids are made by using "thin-layer" technology. For example we have ceramic pipes, and we make a layer of copper, or any good conducting material on its outer surface? The heat exchange between the ceramic pipe and the metal covering would be very good this way (due to the extremely close connection -practically atomic- between the ceramic and the metal layer), but ceramic is a very good insulator too and is durable in the means of ion bombardment. What do you think?
(by time the metal layer decays, but it can be renewed with minimal cost, if thin-layer is not enough we still have thick-layer technology)
Oh and by the way it does not really matter wich way the plasma flows, it can oscillate too.
))