History of Fission

Reflections on fusion history, current events, and predictions for the 'fusion powered future.
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Joe Gayo
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History of Fission

Post by Joe Gayo »

In recent years, the work of Lise Meitner has become more widely known as the story behind the story of identifying the fission process. However, there is another story behind the story, behind the story ... Ida Noddack (Co-Discovered Element 75, Rhenium). Maybe familiar to some but unknown to me until last night.

Unsurprisingly, the pursuit of science isn't immune to human nature with its bias and fallacy. Ideas are born from the connection of many dots and don't spontaneously appear.
A TALE OF OBLIVION - IDA NODDACK.pdf
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Richard Hull
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Re: History of Fission

Post by Richard Hull »

I have mentioned Ida Noddack in a number of past posts on fission. Fabulous find and attachments, Joe!!! Great reads! I have saved them in my Rad stuff folder.

Ida and her husband were well known chemists. There was still a gray zone between chemists and physicists. It would be a few more years before the term radiochemist and nuclear physicist came into common use. Rutherford hinted at a possible neutral particle in the nucleus in a lecture back in 1915. The History of the sciences is important. Hahn did not discover and explain fission. He did fission and was puzzled by chemical results. It was Meitner and her nephew Otto Frisch who, together on a skiing trip, noodled out the results for Hahn's recent letter to Meitner. Frisch raced to the train with Bohr leaving for the U.S. to tell him about fission. Bohr slapped his forehead and said "Of course! How stupid we are". Bohr carried the news to the new world and in a matter of weeks experiments here duplicated and confirmed the nuclear chemistry of Hahn following the Meitner and Frisch explanation. (I read the book, a great read, "All That I can Remember" - Otto Frisch) Hahn would never bring Meitner, his old close confidant, into the lime light around the discovery of fission

The term electrical engineer survived forever until very late in the electronics era. Electronics engineer is quite separate in some quarters now. New discoveries and related technologies demand ever more specific engineering titles.
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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Jim Kovalchick
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Re: History of Fission

Post by Jim Kovalchick »

Here is a museum exhibit of the Meitner experiment from a visit I made with my wife to Munich.
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Richard Hull
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Re: History of Fission

Post by Richard Hull »

Thanks for the images, Jim!

I love those old giant Pertrix B batteries. They were the most used B battery for Physics experiments in Europe. All of this is part of the early history of nuclear research.

Carbon-zinc technology at its finest. When you needed plate voltages from 200 to 500 volts you created series strings of these large puppies. Rectification from the AC line and filtering lagged into the late 20's when basically home radio demand decreased the need for the B battery bank, especially in the U.S.

For critical, zero ripple in some experiments, the physicists hung onto these B battery systems all through WWII. Consumers of portable radios and on farms where there was no electricity during the vacuum tube era continued major demands for high voltage B batteries into the 1960s, (100% carbon-zinc, of course). Until transistors came into common use, 1960s, high voltage B batteries were used in all portable Geiger counters and vacuum tube scientific gear.

As most early lab bench assembled GM detection and PMT systems needed a stable 1000 volts, Pertrix created the large 90V anode batteries. (see image below) You would see 10 to 12 under a table. They had taps every 90 volts so you had 90v, 180v and 270 volts, etc., for tube amplifier anodes and the 900 -1000 volt high end, all referenced to zero volts at the bottom of the string. The image below shows "punch-outs" for 50 and 70 volts in addition to the 90 volts. Table top physics of the 1900-1940 era.

The last of the high voltage B batteries were produced around 2011 when the "Nine Lives" Ever-Ready cat died. They dropped the carbon-zinc technology. China still floods the US market with cheap C-Z dry cells and 9 V transistor batteries.

Eveready, on their label, did not lie about bouncing back like a cat with 9 lives. C-Z technology would self repair after hard use and a voltage drop. Left overnight, they would self-depolarize and be back to full strength, time and time again!! I have seen and quantitatively tested this!

Richard Hull
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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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Jim Kovalchick
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Re: History of Fission

Post by Jim Kovalchick »

Richard,
There was a lot going on with this table experiment that changed the world. What caught my eye first was the bees wax moderator.

The Deutsches Museum displays this table as a masterpiece work. I was in Europe for both business and pleasure on that trip, and seeing that table was my sole purpose for going to Munich.
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Richard Hull
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Re: History of Fission

Post by Richard Hull »

Yes, I saw the "birthday cake moderator" I wonder if the detector was a methane counter or if they had a super hot Ra:Be source and used activation and a GM to do their work? The cobbled up electronics and supporting Z-C battery bank interest me as an electronics person. I used such 45 and 90 v B batteries when I was a kid building tube circuits.

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
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