Re: Articles

["Tesla list" <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Original poster: Jim Lux <jimlux@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>

At 12:10 PM 2/28/2006, Tesla list wrote:
> Original poster: Davetracer@xxxxxxx
> In a message dated 2/27/2006 4:22:15 PM Mountain Standard Time, 
> tesla@xxxxxxxxxx writes:
> http://www.powermanagementdesignline.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=180205456
>
> The key sentence from the above article is this:
>
> "By using the field to accelerate deuterium oxide atoms between the 
> opposing crystals, the engineers fused two deuterium atoms into 
> helium, releasing the excess energy as high-energy neutron 
> particles--the hallmark of nuclear fusion."
>
> Anytime you get neutrons above 1MeV energy, they can fission U-238 
> [not a typo], and then things get way too interesting very quickly. 
> There are lots of things I don't know about fast fission. But your 
> typical hydrogen bomb uses a U-238 casing [not U-235], fuses the 
> hydrogen, takes the > 1 MeV neutrons from the fusion, and  fissions 
> the casing U-238, yielding up to half the total yield.

fission yes, chain reaction no.  And more interestingly, the 238 that 
doesn't fission transmutes into Pu239.  Cool deal in a sort of geek 
chic way (how many people do you know who transmute elements in their 
garage?).. but totally impractical to make any reasonable amount of 
Pu.  The first Pu samples that Seaborg analyzed required milliamps of 
current in the cyclotron at Berkeley for days, and that's to get 
microscopic quantities.  There was a project back in the late 40s, 
early 50s(?) to make a huge linear accelerator to make fissionable 
material (Thorium, I believe).

Look at the neutron rates from the original article.. we're talking a 
few neutrons a second, if that.  Long, long, long way from anything 
"interesting" neutron-wise. As a practical matter, even detecting the 
neutrons from these kinds of reactions is a major challenge.

Now there's a tesla coil application for you... and, in fact, that IS 
something practical to use a TC for...accelerating particles..  The 
few hundred kV from the fair sized TC is more than enough to get 
"interesting" reactions to occur, although the EM fields will raise 
cain with your detectors, so proving that the reactions occurred 
might be problematic.

> Yes, this is off topic, and this is one invention I'm not sure I 
> wish had been invented. :-)

It's been around for a while, and really isn't anything 
revolutionary.  Electrically powered neutron sources (aka the Zipper) 
also from the basis of the "dial-a-yield" capability of modern 
weapons, as well as being the initiator on probably all currently 
fielded weapons.  They're awfully compact in that application (since 
the entire warhead isn't all that big), so the claims of 15x15 cm 
don't strike me as particularly amazing.

nope.. lots of press release blather, really, and a slow news day.