Fusor Forums

Deuterium spectro lamps are a common public use for their UV spectrum. Beyond this and a few other minor and esoteric scientific chores, there is no use for Deuterium gas. It is far too expensive to casually design into an industrial process. besides, it is just hydrogen unless you are talking nuclear stuff.

Richard Hull

So I guess if anyone at the gas supplier is paranoid enough to get nosey...I'm in the lamp business.

It's funny. If you've ordered other gases it's not a big deal. They're not asking from a paranoid perspective. D2 is just an unusual gas for these guys so they're like "Huh, what'r ya using that for?" Usually if you get into details about metabolic tracers, proteins, NMR, cancer treatments/cures, they'll be like ok whatever and get sidetracked. I've heard d2 lamps and lasers work too.

Again, the only time I had a real issue was with one specific SPECTRA GASES rep. All the other vendors were pretty cool. Praxair had some non-proliferation paperwork but it was no biggie.

DON'T ship to an apartment (it's HAZMAT and probably against the rules)
DON'T have a last name that sounds foreign.
DON'T be sketchy, answer the phone, call them, etc.
DO talk intelligently and articulately.
DO work with good, honest, reliable, and reasonable people such as
Advanced Specialty Gases.

One vendor I don't see mentioned:

I bought my 50L cylinder of 99.8 D2 from Cambridge Isotopes ( www.isotopes.com ) a few years ago. (It's still a virgin cylinder if anyone wants it.) They are in Andover, MA. Very friendly service. I just checked the price and it's $94 plus the cylinder at $175.

I was able to get my residential address checked out by Matheson Tri-Gas, even though it took about a week for them to confirm the registration.

Refill: $130/100L (99.7% CP)
Rental for size 4 cylinder: $0.51/day

Should I just bite the bullet and buy the cylinder outright?

Raymond J.

I had no choice. The cylinder was sold as part of the deal and allowed NO refills. There are as many gas deals out there as anyone can imagine. I would never rent a cylinder, ever. I have seven cylinders of various gases at home and own all the cylinders. Only the D2 cylinder is un-refillable.

Richard Hull

I got my kilo of D2O ( the D is 99%) from a co. called CK gases ltd. for £ 173. The company is american, so you should be able to track it down. The price should be ~$200 - 300. I got mine through a co. that I used to work for, in case they had doubts about supplying a private address. My current idea is to electrolyse it in a small cell, made of Cu pipe, calculating the Coulombs to get an overpressure of ~1bar after flushing out air, then try diffusion thru a heated thin Fe or Ni tube. This should keep out water, and other things that are not D2.

Tony Webb

Tony - there are Pallidium coated ceramic tubes on the market for just such purpose.
Also if you drop a small piece ( read tiny ) of Sodium or Calcium into the D2 - you will get all the gas you need.

John Thanks for the info on 'diffusion tubes' I'll have to start looking on eBay [i'm a total newbie on internet matters]. Do the Pd coated tubes work at room temp?? All this is a bit premature, as i haven't yet put together a fusor, but I thought I'd get the D2O while it's still available.
Another way would be to add some P2O5 to acidify rthe D2O without adding any H, then use Mg, or similar metal for the D2 generation. all these will produce 'wet' D2, but I expect mol sieve will fix that

Tony Webb

Remember, any hydroxides formed in your efforts will be deuteroxides and you will lock up deuterium in the new compound as well release some as gas.

Electrolysis is about the only way to warrant getting the use of all the deuterium in the D2O. All is till wet D2, of course. Drying it will also lock up D2O in the drying agent, but it can be reclaimed.

Richard Hull