WB-8 article

[AcesHigh]

I am so glad you asked! See, you (hypothetically) fly into Chicago? Urbana-Champlain? and drive to a local modeling agency and hire two beautiful, intelligent women to accompany you to the party. All these women need to do is listen attentively to the Drs. while the Pessimist, Moderate and Optimist ask respectful questions.

Whatever the Drs. say, the ladies respond appreciatively. It would be better if the women were primed with questions and knew some physics, but that's probably not necessary...See, everybody wins! The Drs. enjoy the attention of attractive women, the Three learn, maybe, what we want to know and the ladies earn some guilt-free cash.

'Course, we'd not dare publish the results of these conversations because the Drs. would probably get in a lot of trouble and we don't want that!

Did I mention the alcohol?

Now, it's going to take a little money...

of course, it will be better if these hoo... I mean, escorting girls, dont have russian accent, or the drs. may remember old spy movies and not feel confident enough to tell them those kinds of secrets.

[Ivy Matt]

Bussard didn't seem that pessimistic even at the end.

I'd say he had a rather atypical career for a fusion scientist. Perhaps the key is to avoid becoming dependent on the vicissitudes of DOE funding.

[icarus]

Actually, the best of all outcomes is that they announce that all the data they have collected so far points towards likely break-even fusion, at a feasible size and field strength machine, and they release all the data to prove it.

Like any straight-forward, fair-dinkum good science worthy of talking about in 300 years time.

Anything else is just noise.

[TallDave]

Ahh, true, but it should give a percentage completion. And given the project is complete for "April" according to the contract, the Jan-Mar update should reflect that they are on schedule or not, as required by recovery act reporting requirements.

Ah, good point. Thanks for sharing. Now, if only they would also provide the fusion power and loss scaling...

Note, that previous reports stated on schedule, until the latest. Which dropped this, but did say plasma in November. Looking the timelines inferred in the contract, as well as testing timelines from WB6 and 7, it would seem that they should have had plasma before November.

I was somewhat worried they would never get past arcing (which I gather was not particularly well understood as a problem) so atm I'm just glad they got plasma. It does appear it took some months longer to finish the device that originally planned.

CLIN 0001 - 30 Apr 2010 (= plasma wiffleball 8 ) - Completion of device build.
CLIN 0002 - 30 Apr 2011 (= Data) - Completion of WB8 testing
CLIN 0003 - 31 Oct 2011 (= Optional WB 8.1) - Completion of optional device build
CLIN 0004 - 31 Oct 2012 (= Optional Data) - Completion of optional device testing

It's interesting they've hired two physicists. I'd like to think that means they have good results and are working on WB-100/D design, but of course it's hard to say whether it really means anything.

[KitemanSA]

CLIN 0001 - 30 Apr 2010 (= plasma wiffleball 8 ) - Completion of device build.

Since I wrote that, I guess I should modify it. As I read things now, that was the delivery date for the core itself, not NECESSARILY the entire device. We won't know if they were late until some time in 2017ish ( ) when the data is finally released!

[ladajo]

Kite,
I'll need to go back and look, but I am pretty sure that was device constructed, and testing to start. Not just core delivered. And as I recall, it fit the timelines. I think when the contract was written, they were not thinking to move to CA. Not sure on that though.
I thought the post in Wikipedia was a merger of the CLIN posting from you and comments from me in one of the threads here. No matter.
Gah, the waiting sucks.

[KitemanSA]

This is becoming my most accurate emoticon:

Orz

Me beating my head against the floor! I tend to wear pale blue shirts and navy blue pants.

[choff]

Maybe the reason Rick isn't listed as a officer at EMC2 now is because he's already working on a full scale black box polywell project for the navy?

[TallDave]

Well, you know, they'll need something to power that badass megawatt FEL.

Isn't the free electron laser an ONR project as well? It can't hurt PW's prospects that FEL seems to be doing well as a Navy project.

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/02 ... -a-record/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-electron_laser

[DeltaV]

Well, you know, they'll need something to power that badass megawatt FEL.

Isn't the free electron laser an ONR project as well? It can't hurt PW's prospects that FEL seems to be doing well as a Navy project.

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/02 ... -a-record/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-electron_laser

I remember reading Aviation Week and Space Technology in the late 1970's where they mentioned particle beam research programs such as "White Horse" and "Sipapu":
http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/systems/npb.htm

For the Army, Sipapu was a neutral beam, space-based weapon, ranked second in priority to Chair Heritage and is receiving in excess of $10 million in 1980. This Army program, being conducted at the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory in New Mexico, is based on advanced Soviet technology demonstrated in a Russian-designed plasma generating device.

[Giorgio]

Maybe the reason Rick isn't listed as a officer at EMC2 now is because he's already working on a full scale black box polywell project for the navy?

I doubt, that will be a waste of energies and resources for a project that has yet to prove to be viable.

[Aero]

Maybe the reason Rick isn't listed as a officer at EMC2 now is because he's already working on a full scale black box polywell project for the navy?

I doubt, that will be a waste of energies and resources for a project that has yet to prove to be viable.

The unstated assumption underlying choff's statement is that polywell has already proven itself viable to those in the know.

"Those in the know" does not include me, nor do I think it includes anyone else here on Talk-Polywell.

[KitemanSA]

"Those in the know" does not include me, nor do I think it includes anyone else here on Talk-Polywell.

At least if there IS someone in the know here on T-P, tse is remarkably adept at hiding it!

[Giorgio]

The unstated assumption underlying choff's statement is that polywell has already proven itself viable to those in the know.

"Those in the know" does not include me, nor do I think it includes anyone else here on Talk-Polywell.

Even if you consider that assumption my argument does not change, on the contrary it becomes more solid.

If Polywell has been proven functional than splitting the team and the resources makes little sense.

[Axil]

What does “proven viable” mean for the navy? It usually means cost; a cost and capabilities comparison against some other alternative. What is that existing or future alternative?

The Polywell can function well but still be rejected for further development by the Navy because it has irretrievably lost the cost/capabilities comparison against its alternative.

Furthermore, just because the navy might stops funding the Polywell development, that does not necessarily mean that Polywell can’t function well in another context.