Fusion Message Board

In this space, visitors are invited to post any comments, questions, or skeptical observations about Philo T. Farnsworth's contributions to the field of Nuclear Fusion research.

Subject: Re: Dispenser Cathode & Anode Ionizer?
Date: Jun 05, 11:02 am
Poster: Richard Hull

On Jun 05, 11:02 am, Richard Hull wrote:

It must be remembered that the ITT/Farnsworth plant in Fort Wayne specialized in PHOTO Cathodes!

They owned the IR Sniperscope market during WW II and the Korean war. As such, they could whip up bizarre, one off cathode arrangements in their sleep.

The Fusor cathode of Hirsch and Meeks was of such a design.

It was a "halo" sort of affair. It was indirectly heated. A 1/8" hollow, circular tube of silver has a fine tungsten/thorium filament suspended within. The outer surface of the cathode was given a special emmissive coating. This was the cathode assembly and ran at a very low heat (barely red.) This halo cathode was placed near the outer wall of the chamber between it and the ionizer grid.

The spherical "ionizer" grid (SS) was given an S-1 response coating (cesiated silver) This was biased positive (100-200v) with respect to the cathode and outer chamber case which was grounded and at a high positive potential with respect to the innermost hollow cathode.

Thus, when copius electrons were created by bombardment of the S-1 grid surface by filamentary electrons, They were forced to constantly "sepentine" around he ionizer grid region, being repelled by the nearby negative (relative) chamber wall and the horrendously negative distant hollow cathode.

Thus, we had a trapped cloud of high speed electrons making deuterons from the deuterium gas collisions just where they were needed. That is, out near the shell of the chamber allowing the bulk of them to infall for full energy gain to the inner grid region.

Very, very ingenious.

No, there are no on line sources for the patent. I am stunned Bert Pool missed this key patent which is the only one describing what we are making. Of course, he was doing a Farnsworth patent thing and not a fusor patent thing. I have given him the number. He may or may not scan in the patent to the patent list he has so graciously put on line at his web site. I have no scanner and no web site.

Richard Hull




>As I have been unable to locate the Hirsch/Meeks patent #3,530,497, would it be possible to get a description of the Dispenser Cathode and Anode Ionizer mentioned in an earlier post. Is there a copy of 3,530,497 available on the net somewhere?
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>Congrats on the turbo, Richard.
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