Reply To: Military Effects

[asymmetric_implosion]

R. E. Beverly III & Associates does customize switches for the user application. They built the original switches on FoFu-1. 🙁

Pseudo-sparks are possible. I don’t know enough about them to give stats on performance. My guess is that their lifetime is not going to be the 1E9 shots you need to feel good about them. Gas based switches are inherently limited by the cathode erosion. You can increase the cathode area and optimize materials (which is largely done if I understand it correctly). Large switches tend to be high inductance which limits current for a given charge voltage which means more switches or increased voltage. I’ve heard mixed reviews from folks that use pseudo-sparks; some love them and some hate them.

I offer you this bit of optimism. FrancisL found a paper on using a transformer PF that I wrote a year or so back. The idea, in principle, can be expanded to a 3 MA machine. The transformer ratio would probably drop from 6:1 to 3:1 to keep the voltages reasonable for thyratron switches or pseudo-sparks, if you prefer. This reduces the switch count by 3. Take the $136.5K and divide by 3 to get a number slightly less than the money generated from electricity. Now you have to address the capacitors which are truly limited to 1E8 shots. I don’t know of a way around it in a high current cap. I know 1 kHz caps exist and they are used commercially at the 50 kV level and currents of ~10 kA so there already is a market to drive the development. One might argue that caps are not required if you use inductive energy storage methods but those require some work as well.

My point is not to say it is impossible to produce cost effective fusion. The point is that a great deal of science is required to make it cost effective. Step 1 is showing gain. Step 2 and so on will use the requirements of a gain configuration to develop the energy conversion, materials, pulse power and eventually the business plan.