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: [OT] Maxwell & Ceramite Price Lists
Date: Oct 29, 01:13 am
Poster: Jim LuxOn Oct 29, 01:13 am, Jim Lux wrote:
Why not call Maxwell Labs and get their Energy Storage Capacitor and Marx Generator brochures for a start. They are in San Diego, CA. The number was (619)576-7545, but may have changed.
As a price point. about 2 yrs ago I priced a Maxwell model 31438 (.44 uF, 75 kV, plastic case, 1 pps rep rate) at $1100 each and $620 each for Q:10-24.
C&H Sales in Pasadena CA and RF Parts in San Marcos, CA both carry the doorknob caps (albeit Sprague, the predecessor to Ceramite..)
The higher voltage Marx generators from Maxwell are nice and compact and designed to operate either in oil or SF6. SF6 is pricey these days, but, it is a lot cleaner and nicer to work with than oil. Oil is $25/5 gallon pail, and much cheaper by the drum or tank truck lot ($2/gal).
For only 100 kV, I'd go with something like a straight cap discharge (use two caps in series to get the voltage rating) or a transmission line pulse former (distilled water dielectric is popular, and works great for short pulses).
The Marx is nifty in concept, but a mechanical engineering challenge, particularly as the number of stages grows. They are also notorious for uneven max voltage on the impulse. The Fitch circuit is claimed to be more consistent, but I don't have first hand experience with it, and it does require some HV diodes.
Plenum Press published a series of conference proceeding type books called Exploding Wires, which would be worth taking a look at. Lots of very fast, very high current and voltage pulse generators using staged capacitors and air core impulse transformers. (exploding wires were the way fusion was going to reach breakeven real soon now (in 1959), heh, heh, heh).