Fusor Forums

Hi All,
This is my Fusor progress.
This project began 08/20. It has been a while in the making, with the gradual acquisition and manufacture of components, fitted in in sparse life downtime.
Many thanks to John Futter, who supplied some of the key components.
The chamber is a recycled leybold turbovac 450 casing (this machine disintegrated). Dia is 7" or ~180mm, halfway in betweeen the suggested 6-8".

Diffusion pump - Edwards 650W
A Futter special! Ex an electron microscope system.
Comes with buffer tank and system. HV feedthrough:

Chamber mods:
This was a blanking flange.

A plus-size turbo turned into a fusor? I hope you have a mating throttle valve to couple the diff pump to the fusor. Gas flow control is critical. That is quite a volume there.

Richard Hull

well done mike
keep posting

Chamber mods.
Added a view port (3" SCH 10 SS), KF 25 ports, NPT sockets etc.
All welds on inside.
Chamber to diffpump adapter.
5" SCH40 SS pipe was a perfect match. The cone was developed and hand formed in 2.5mm SS.
Machined a flange to connect to existing chamber flange. I should have just cut the exisitng flange off and welded the cone directly to the chamber.
All welds on inside or autogenous full penetration (no virtual leaks).
Only machined diff pump flange post welding.

Richard Hull wrote: ↑Mon Sep 13, 2021 12:22 am A plus-size turbo turned into a fusor? I hope you have a mating throttle valve to couple the diff pump to the fusor. Gas flow control is critical. That is quite a volume there.

Richard Hull

Yes.
The diff pump has a built in high vac valve, with fine control, which will be used for throttling.
See adapter images above.

I am having trouble posting images here. It only works for me very ocasionaly. I get:
"Error

It was not possible to determine the dimensions of the image. Please verify that the URL you entered is correct."

See below:
Note I am just using the "Add files" button in attachments, and uploading local files. Not trying to link anywhere.

Yes, it is painful and ironic that I can post a screen shot of the error message, but not the actual images!

Can anyone tell me how to make this work?

Mikes having trouble posting pics so i'm doing it for him

Some more HV xformer Xformer specs Ballast, Caps 4nF 60kV variac Rectifier Tantalum grid Pirani gauge full setup First High Vac

Thanks John for uploading those.
A quick credit: the PSU and HV gear has been kindly leant to the project by an electrical engineer friend Mike D*. I will leave it up to him to out himself here if he so chooses.

First plasma:
~10kV
Argon

Struggled a bit getting settings right etc. Will give you some better numbers next time after we refine the setup more.