Reactor parts arriving…
Parts…
I haven’t had much time to write anything in a while but decided to post an update to my nuclear reactor project. A bunch of parts arrived today, pictured above. Most of what is pictured are components of the power supply, plus one item for the vacuum chamber. The gray cylinder in the upper left with an attached power cord is a variable transformer, used to control the level of the high voltage supply. The two black bars at the top are special high voltage diodes needed to rectify the AC voltage, essentially turning AC into DC. The two small items in the upper left of the pic are components of the current monitoring system, a current meter and a high wattage current shunt.
I’m still waiting for other components of the power supply, namely a high voltage transformer that is capable of converting the 120v AC from a wall outlet into many thousands of volts required for the reactor. I have to build the supply from components, mainly because commercial power supplies, even used ones, usually cost thousands of dollars unless you wait a long time and get lucky on eBay.
The thing in the lower center that looks like a pipe cross is exactly that! It is a 5-way cross that I intend to use as my reactor chamber. It is made of stainless steel and has special connectors at each opening called Conflat flanges. These connectors allow you to attach a vacuum pump, instruments, windows, more pipes, etc., to build a custom ultrahigh vacuum system. Kind of like Legos. Very expensive Legos. A new 5-way cross of this size can run in excess of $600. Much cheaper on eBay.
I also bought a Soviet made neutron counter tube that was shipped from the Ukraine (pic below). I intend to use this as the detector part of the neutron detector. I have no idea if it is still a viable tube, but I’ll try it. Notice that it came packed in newspaper from the Ukraine!
More to come…
Posted in Nuclear Fusion Reactor by Mark with comments disabled.