Talk-Polywell.org

@ Hanleyp: Ahh, tricky! Ok, that might work. @MSimon: the Q&A section on that FPG website suggests that they are running the grid at negative bias but still expecting a virtual well due to the electron confinement. They *are* having ions go in and out of the grid as part of the oscillation, but they...

Gotta remember that those things are going to intercept alpha's like crazy if they aren't in the shadow of the coils, though. It'll be a trade-off, I guess.

That's amazing! Nice work.

MSimon said: "I was thinking of the grid structure as a way to confine electrons by channeling them." In other words, maybe we could use electrostatic lensing to protect the surface of the magrid next to the line cusp where the B-field sheilding is poor? @Hanleyp: I like the look of that. But I don'...

Hmm. Going back to what drmike said, I wonder what kind of B-field and negative bias it would take to keep 10keV electrons from hitting a permanent magnet? I know the mirror effect couldn't stop all the electrons, but what kind of negative charge on the magnet would repell the rest? If the magnets w...

So I take it that low-energy ions clogging up the core and neutralizing the potential well are not a percieved problem. Good. Here's a related thought: if the ions are going to pseudo-thermalize to a non-maxwellian state, all the ions will have the same energy, correct? As in, they will come out wit...

I don't understand the electrostatic lens idea well enough, but it looks as though the catch in their work is to make sure that the scattered ions coming out of the core make it back into acceptable channels. Since the polywell is confining electrons with magnetic fields, and the ions don't have to ...

Is there such a thing as ion loss in the polywell? I guess neutralization shouldn't be possible because of the high energies all around, but what about loosing energy some way, maybe brems. or inelastic collisions or something. I can't imagine that an ion is always going to keep its same speed up, e...

What do you have in mind? A simple magnetic bottle? It would be interesting to learn about them, for sure. As I understand it, without the mirror effect, the magrid would still be sheilded, but it would not confine the electrons to the center of the machine and create the wiffleball. I think that th...

I'm into amateur experimental rocketry, spud-gunning, and electrostatics. I like to keep up with the new-space industry as well.

Kind of going with what MSimon was talking about in terms of manifolds the other day, would there be any way to deal with the magnetic and electric fields together using a relativistic description of the electrons? I've never heard of such a thing, so I'm guessing it's a dumb idea. My thought was th...

@John: I'm guessing that the large machines need bigger B-fields, though I don't know by how much, off-hand. It probably has something to do with Bussard's scaling laws. But I still had the impression it wouldn't make it to the T level. @Windmill: good to get some input from someone who takes a diff...

John, you are right. Cusps are where the loss problems crop up. As I understand it, there's a trade off between bring the coils close enough together to trap the electrons without making them bump into the coil. But every machine is going to have cusps. I am just trying to throw out some ideas. I'm ...

@scareduck: I was speaking there about my idea, not about Bussard's whole plan! Sorry I was unclear. After reading the latest paper here: http://ecow.engr.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/getbig/ne/527/anderson/notes/bussard_wb6rpt080604fnl0107.pdf I really think the polywell could be workable. @drmike: yeah, the p...

Terminology issues. Bah. I would have taken trapping factor to mean the ability to keep the electrons in the wiffleball as opposed to having them escape through the cusps (regardless of recirculation). I would use something like "shielding factor" ( or the transport coefficient Bussard uses) to talk...