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Paul_Schatzkin
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Post by Paul_Schatzkin »

"Like the mythological sword Excalibur, the secret of the Fusor lies frozen in the rock of institutional orthodoxy....when the time is right, the mystery will finally reveal itself, the stone will unlock its secrets, the quiet passion of Philo T. Farnsworth will be re- awakened, and the dawn of a new civilization will truly be upon us."

From The Boy Who Invented Television: A Story of Inspiration, Persistence and Quiet Passion (2002) page 249.
There was a time when I really believed that.

I still want to believe that.

But as I get up in years (71 in November) I am also coming to grips with the possibility that my desire to believe exceeds the actual likelihood.

*

Frank gave me a heads up last week that things were going a little 'pear shaped' here in the Virtual Land of the Colliding Deuterons, that some of our number got a little bent out of shape over some questions about criteria, inclusion, who can do what and how fast – and the always legitimate question, "What are we doing here?"

Whenever I hear from Frank or Richard, it's a reminder to me that I have been pretty much MIA for the past year and, well, a half. And when I do chime in, I feel like I need to account for absence. So kindly indulge me for few paragraphs:

As I have observed (too many times?) before, my interest in Farnsworth and fusion has ebbed and flowed over the decades since I first met the family in the summer of 1975. It was in 'flow' mode at the start of 2020 when Frank and Jonathan Moulton (Farnsworth's great grandson) and I and a few others gathered at the home of Phil Savenick in Los Angeles for the "WaterStar Summit." Phil's house has become the depository of much of what remains of the Farnsworth Family Archives, including several artifacts from the 'fusion era' – not the least a mostly intact 'cave' model fusor from the mid 1960s. All of that has been documented elsewhere http://fusor.net/board/viewtopic.php?f=70&t=13268.

And then... Covid. What can I say? Pandemics do strange things to people. I became pretty much a recluse out here in West Bumfuque, Tennessee.

But it was more than just the virus. In the interval between the 'summit' in January and the lockdowns in March, Richard started posting the well documented accounts from his "Attic" http://fusor.net/board/viewtopic.php?f=70&t=13269 of all the detective work he'd done in the early 'aughts with the survivors of the Farnsworth / ITT fusion team in Fort Wayne. When he got to:
Bob Hirsch was less circumspect and one day came to Bain and showed him Farnsworth's math, telling Bain, "Farnsworth is crazy!" "This math can't be used at all....His figures are just not right!"

(from 'Two good years 1965-1966 lots of ideas')
http://fusor.net/board/viewtopic.php?f= ... =10#p86421
...what little air was left in the balloon I've been holding aloft for 4 decades fizzled out. Call it a pandemic-induced loss of faith.

Lately I've been recalling a moment in... I dunno, 1978 or there abouts...  I was visiting the Farnsworths – widow Pem, oldest son Philo III and youngest son Kent – at Pem's modest (cluttered) home in Salt Lake City. I was there to research the back story around the invention of television, but I kept spying the guts of the early bell-jar fusors tucked away in a den at one end of the house.  I sensed that the subject was sensitive, that they were protective of the material, but I kept making veiled queries.  At some point, Pem became exasperated and said “you’re just interested in the fusion work, aren’t you?” 

I deflected the question at the time, but I have to admit, it was true.  That’s what’s kept me intrigued for nearly five decades now.  Go back and read my account of the afternoon on the hillside in Santa Cruz in the summer of 1973 and you'll understand the source of my intrigue. http://fusor.net/board/viewtopic.php?f= ... =10#p86421

I spent 25 years with the Farnsworth story before I cobbled things I'd written into the book. As Pem suspected I might from the outset, I was intent on creating a narrative trajectory out of the cosmic riddle – "How do you bottle a star?" – that had caught the imagination of a pot-addled 20-something refugee from the 1960s in the late summer of 1973.

This site site started in 1998 - four years before my book was published. At the time, it was a bit of a lark: I'd just finished posting a treatment of the Farnsworth / origins-of-television story http://farnovision.com/chronicles/ on the website I'd created to sell CDs for my indie musician friends in Nashville, songs.com. I just kinda tossed into the digital ether the question, "anybody interested in Farnsworth's fusion initiative?" And, lo and behold, somebody was: Richard Hull had only recently been approached by Tom Ligon, who had worked with Robert Bussard (of polywell fusor fame), and like a Johnny Appleseed, Tom was spreading the gospel of inertial electrostatic containment.

20-some years later, this is one of the oldest and most vibrant destinations on the Internet. It is certainly a vast well of specialized knowledge and an invaluable resource for anybody with more than a casual interest in the topic. Most of the information compiled here is of a highly technical nature, from vacuum pumping to neutron counting. Just click on the link for the 'Active Topics" and you'll see what I mean.

Which is kinda where I become a spectator or a cheerleader.

I have always been entranced with the idea of fusion, more than the nuts-and-bolts and particles-and-forces of it. I am nobody's idea of a scientist - I'm a writer (on a good day), a yarn spinner –and a bit of a fantasist.

Actual electronics are not my strong suit. Hell, I haven’t personally done anything with electricity since I re-wound the armatures of slot-car motors. When I was a teenager. In the 1960s. When the Beatles were still touring...

So I tend to glaze over at the granular details about fusor construction and operation.  I’m glad all that content is there, but it’s lost on me. 

But, hey, indulge me in some speculation about a compact, fusion-powered high-voltage generator tied to a synthetic gravity generator that can bend space and.... off I go again – "high on the real thing...". http://www.drumforum.org/threads/ot-fav ... 381/page-6

And then the pandemic, and then Richard's honest but gut-wrenching histories, and... Where once I thought useful electrical energy from controlled fusion was an obtainable Holy Grail, now I'm wondering if it's just a pipe dream, an hallucination, a delusion.

I think I discovered my own unique powers of self-deception when I observed that the spherical multipactor that I'd fondled in LA, the tube that started all this was...
...the tube that produced the failure that produced the success that is still a failure.

(from: Re: Richard Hull's Attic)
http://fusor.net/board/viewtopic.php?f= ... ure#p86240
I am subject to such delusions. How else do you explain six years in a rabbit hole in which there is no rabbit? http://ttbrown.com

*

But then I think, ya know, this site? It's really something.

Fusor.net is the world's foremost repository of information and data about one of the truly esoteric - but valuable - realms of modern science. While I am not responsible for any of the useful data here, I know had a hand in starting it. I was in the right place at the right time with some nominal web-building skills and a genuine (if misguided) interest in the subject. I tossed the ball in the air in 1998; the skilled practitioners (too numerous to name) caught it and ran with it, and I could cheer them on from the sidelines and run interference at times in the form of re-situating things when the need arose. There have been some bumps and bruises along the way, some photos lost as we moved from one ISP to another, but the basic structure and purpose remains intact after more than 20 years. That is a rarity on the Interwebs.

But that's not what I came to talk to you about (and, no, Alice, I did not come to talk about the draft...)

I came to reiterate, from my perspective, my answer to Frank's question, "what are we doing here?"

We are carrying a torch, pure and simple.

And in Olympic fashion (how timely!) anybody who wants to carry that torch is welcome for whatever portion of the relay they want to carry it. There is no alpha or omega, only the journey and the passing of the torch.

Over the past week or so I have been bouncing text messages and emails back and forth with Richard and Frank, and from those exchanges I think we can identify at least three ongoing and vital roles that fusor.net has and will continue to fill:
1. It's a unique and outstanding source of mentoring. It is genuinely gratifying to see the 'old hands' here embrace the newcomers when they arrive. Whether or not anybody ever 'cracks the code' and figures out a path to 'Q', the exchange of knowledge here is a joy and a wonder to behold.

2. This site is a vast and ever-growing historical resource and knowledge base. I think it is reasonable to say that fusor.net is one of the glowing examples of the 'open source' potential of the Internet. At a time when platforms like Facebook and Twitter are challenging the foundations of our culture, this site demonstrates the real potential of these 21st century technologies.

3. Despite my current state of moderate disillusionment, I continue to believe that, when the time is right, some kind of kismet will erupt from the knowledge base here, and some grand idea will be triggered and... well... you know... on to the stars...
*

So let's revisit the basics:

The genesis of this site was the Farnsworth (Hirsch, Meeks, etal) Inertial Electrostatic Containment device called the "Fusor." Hence the domain, Fusor.net. And that, I believe should continue to be the primary focus regardless of how ultimately promising (or discredited) that approach may be. Whatever foundation this point of origin has created, whatever benefit it has come to provide, all derives from that original intent.

Fusor.net has never been about "neutrons by any means" – but we have always maintained a forum for those who cared to delve into other approaches. I believe that, also, should continue, and I don't think any of the recent ripples of discontent threaten that accommodation.

In the meantime, from my long term, somewhat fantastical perspective, I just don't see how it matters who can fire up a fusor in what period of time, how quickly they can produce neutrons or make some element radioactive.

Those are all intriguing and perhaps useful benchmarks, but the progress here should be measured in what can be learned in the course of our efforts.

And frankly, I am proud, and we should all be proud, that this site is the world's leading resource of such learnings.

By all means, carry on.

--PS
Paul Schatzkin, aka "The Perfesser" – Founder and Host of Fusor.net
Author of The Boy Who Invented Television: 2023 Edition – https://amz.run/6ag1
"Fusion is not 20 years in the future; it is 60 years in the past and we missed it."
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Richard Hull
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Re: Back to Basics

Post by Richard Hull »

Great piece Paul! Telling it like it is and should be. I think any stormy weather is now well off to our stern. It is great to hear from the creator every now and then. Not from Mount Olympus, but from the original perspective in a bit of sad storied paradise faded, if not lost.

The fusor is a fusion device. Improvement means and demands more fusion. As we can't be inside the reactor to measure the fast moving Tritons, Protons and helium 3 nuclei made by fusion, (they can never leave the fusor as they slam into the walls and are absorbed - die there), there remains only the neutron that externally heralds fusion. (it can whistle right through the shell of the fusor like it is not even there). Thus, the seeming battle for more neutrons is part of the battle for more fusion. (part of the original mission for fusors). 10 million neutrons exiting the fusor each second means that we just did 20million fusions per second in our fusors.

Why all the hub-bub about activation? Well, as the fusion increases, our neutron detectors can become swamped with a continuous tone instead of just click-click. At some point Activation which demands a lot of neutrons be present must take over this task. We just got too good for traditional detectors. As a good soldier has a right to be proud of his skill in arms, so a fusioneer has a right to be proud of his level of fusion and any innovations he makes along the way.

That is right... "HE".... the dominant pronoun here. No woman would be so foolish as to spend her spare time doing fusion at the amateur level. We certainly have not seen more than 2 show up here in the 23 years and they may have a total of 5 posts before moving on. I think some women lurkers are here for sure. They might be generally interested in the concept and potential of fusion energy, but the moment they learn our fusion efforts will not produce 1 watt of fusion energy, they move on. Dennis Brown, a regular, long-time poster here, has a daughter who got interested in fusion and came to HEAS one year. She now has her degree in Physics and works on the new German Stellarator!! Yes, what is old is new again. They are still building them, but bigger, more costly, and better, of course.

Believe me, we have had a lot of guys post here looking to power something up with the fusor they hope to build. (just like guys, they rush in rather that lurk, listen and study). They never post more than 2-5 posts before they are not around anymore. Me, Frank, Jon, Mark, John, Dennis, Rich and others who have been here over the years have seen many come and virtually an equal number go. Sounds like failure, but no! There is always a cadre of new folks who light the joint up. Any moribund periods are short here.

Paul, you gave us this venue for study, construction, sharing and compilation of data. It may turn out to be one of your lasting laurels in this life, even if it sometimes seems to have dashed you grand dreams on the rocks. If the normal streams of posting here leave your head spinning out of control in "tech land", do not fret. You created the school and the teachers and students came. Like all schools we have a lot of dropouts. We have even seen a few teachers leave as in any school. Some came as students some years back, and now return as teachers as with any school.

I remember in the movie "Animal House" at the opening, the camera pans past the statue of Emil Faber, founder of the college. Paul, you are our Emil Faber. As the camera pans down to the base of the statue we see his famous quote..."knowledge is good". How true this is here at fusor.net.

Thanks Paul

Richard Hull
Progress may have been a good thing once, but it just went on too long. - Yogi Berra
Fusion is the energy of the future....and it always will be
The more complex the idea put forward by the poor amateur, the more likely it will never see embodiment
Jon Rosenstiel
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Re: Back to Basics

Post by Jon Rosenstiel »

Great piece from both Paul and Richard! Thank you.

Jon Rosenstiel
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Dennis P Brown
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Re: Back to Basics

Post by Dennis P Brown »

Excellent overview Paul of your dedication to fusors and its fascinating history. Thank you.

Also, I'd like to thank Richard Hull for his outstanding work on this forum - he reads so many posts, comments with insightful and useful comments, and is a gold mine of useful information. He helps holds the site together and makes it certainly the place for the world-wide fusor community to meet, talk, share and have great interactions.

His yearly conference at his home - the HEAS meeting - is the Mecca of the fusor community; between the fascinating displays, the interesting presentations of work/science, sale of useful items, and sheer hospitality of him and everyone there, it is certainly a really great time for anyone who can make it. His tolerance of all us interlopers at his home is simply amazing (and as well as his wife. She endures us too. And I'd like to thank her for opening her home to us!) I'm amazed the Hull's managed to do this even once much less enduring us year after year after ... well, you get the picture. Many a young person has launched their career in science and some in plasma physics who have attended his meetings - as Richard has mentioned my own daughter.

Yes, as Richard said about that fun movie "Animal House", Paul is our Emil Faber. Richard is more like our Daniel Simpson who was D-Day: the man in the "fraternity" who really made and built the key stuff and was at the heart of all their activities.

All I will add is - Did the Germans really attack Peral Harbor? (for those who have never seen the movie, this is a reference made in it by a character.)
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Richard Hull
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Re: Back to Basics

Post by Richard Hull »

Paul's post that started this thread saddens me a bit. He, like Farnsworth had a dream.... Farnsworth's dream. No a bad dream, either. Certainly, it is currently an unrealized dream. An impossible dream? I cannot say, but the evidence is not good in the light of current physics directed at fusion.

Paul's original dream has created a wonderment. He has created fusor.net. As he noted, his immediate dream may have died but the dreams and hands on efforts to create and study fusion at a level far beyond the common understanding has taken place. Because of Paul's efforts and the internet, more people than ever before understand the many realities and issues of fusion and the physics involved. A smarter public, even if still but a fractional number now have a real feel for the core level understand around the fusion quest.

I present a paper around Farnsworth's and later Paul's dream of fusor.net and how some reasonable questions relate to its divergence from its original mission for some older members and currently active participants. It is a paper of reconciliations and calming of any differences that only recently have come to the fore. Beam on target fusion is currently a focus as it is perhaps a more efficient and less costly path to amateur fusion over the IECF fusion as originally focus on here at fusor.net. Some feel the original mission is now subverted to more fusion at all costs. For many more, it is a way to advance experimentation where the neutrons produced by D-D fusion are the darling object of our desiring.

I offer this PDF paper in response to all... My observations, of course.

Richard Hull
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Origins .pdf
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Progress may have been a good thing once, but it just went on too long. - Yogi Berra
Fusion is the energy of the future....and it always will be
The more complex the idea put forward by the poor amateur, the more likely it will never see embodiment
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