We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Discuss how polywell fusion works; share theoretical questions and answers.

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mattman
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Joined: Tue May 27, 2008 11:14 pm

We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by mattman »

Hello All,

We ought to have a new film to explain the Polywell.

This film: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7f5d-bRgieI

...is a start, but improvements should be made.

The format should be:

1. The fusion mechanism. Broken down into distinct steps.
2. A quick summary of why this might fail.
3. A quick summary of why this might work
4. Credible sources/further information.


Many people around here have written/drawn out/explained/debated this idea, till they are blue in the face. People deserve more credit for all this effort. I think we do it because this stuff is awesome. That is why a group edited film would be better, so many people can contribute.

A suggested format could be something similar to this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc

The format is a narration, while an innocuous hand sketches out concepts on a white board. The form is pretty simple.

The first step is writing out the fusion mechanism in clear language and distinct steps.

KitemanSA
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Re: We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by KitemanSA »

If you are going to describe how this thing works, start off with a Farnsworth fusor and describe it in simple terms. Then describe why it works but will never produce energy. Then go to the Elmore Tuck Watson varient and describe how it works and why it will never produce energy. THEN describe how the Polywell fixes the problem with the ETW fusor and there you have it. Simplest to one that may work to produce energy.

mattman
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Re: We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by mattman »

I would agree with fusors as a starting point. The polywell fuses in the same manner.

happyjack27
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Re: We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by happyjack27 »

i agree with the chronology. the elmore-tuck-watson inversion might be a bit hard to grasp. maybe spend some extra time explaining what makes it work better. that or omit it and go directly to the polywell. either way. an incomplete explanation might cause more confusion than it removes, and the principles learned from the elmore-tuck-watson can just as well be explained through the polywell, imo. though i wouldn't want the video to give an inaccurate history, or to not give credit where it's due. and a passing mention might be more of a "wtf?" moment than a compromise.

KitemanSA
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Re: We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by KitemanSA »

I think a full explanation of the ETW would make the Polywell easy to grasp, especially if the magnets are FIRST described as protection for the grid but then something interesting happens, the wiffleball effect.

Roger
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Location: Metro NY

Re: We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by Roger »

What is the singular goal of a new Polywell video?
Who is the target audience?

That U tube vid is horrid. It does nothing to introduce the non science type to the fundamentals of polywell. Kiss theorem fail. AS far as appealing to those that already understand those fundamentals, there is no need to supply those same people with a video, they know about electron gyro radius etc.. In fact some comments say that are lost in the 1st 5 minutes.

I've talked to John Palms of Exelon and described to him in 2 minutes how polywell works, I've given the same 2 minute speech to co workers at coffee break, friends and family, and they get it.
I like the p-B11 resonance peak at 50 KV acceleration. In2 years we'll know.

mattman
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Joined: Tue May 27, 2008 11:14 pm

Re: We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by mattman »

Your audience is a 12 year old kid.

Image

If you can explain to him how the Polywell works in a few minutes,

using concepts he understands,

you will win a major battle for fusion.

Roger
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Re: We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by Roger »

Are you calling John Palms a 12 year old?

Past President @ GSU, USC, Former Director of Exelon

http://investing.businessweek.com/resea ... LON%20CORP
I like the p-B11 resonance peak at 50 KV acceleration. In2 years we'll know.

mattman
Posts: 459
Joined: Tue May 27, 2008 11:14 pm

Re: We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by mattman »


Storyboard for: “Polywell - the quick explanation”


The format for this film is a person reading this script. This is the audio, over a video of a hand making sketches on a whiteboard. Below is the suggested script. This is similar to this kind of film: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc
Hate this format? Hate this script? Mad about this idea? Speak up!



=====

1. The Polywell is a new idea for a fusion reactor. It uses six rings in a box.

2. There are four interesting points in these machines: the axis (pause) the corner (pause) the joint (pause) and the center.

3. Each ring is a coil of copper wiring inside a smooth steel shell. These are electromagnets. Each has a north and south pole.

4. Each pole faces into the center. This creates a magnetic field pressure inside the rings. This pressure can contain electrons and ions. Tokomaks use similar fields.

5. Outside the rings is a cage. This cage is charged negative to the rings. Electrons are released. They fly towards the rings and get caught. They start to corkscrew along the magnetic field lines and pass into the center. In the center there is a null point which can scatter them. They head to the corners and hit a dense field. They are reflected and trapped.

6. When billions of electrons are trapped they make a negative cloud in the center. This cloud may look like a 14 point star. Each "spike" in the star would be pointed to the sides and corners of the rings.

7. This cloud makes a large electric field. This field accelerates ions to fusion conditions. When the ions hit in the center they can fuse.

8. Deuterium gas is puffed in.

9. Because it is uncharged, the gas crosses to the rings without problems. When it reaches the edge of the cloud it exchanges energy with the electrons. It ionizes. The ion falls towards the center. When they hit, they can fuse. The electric field is doing work on the ions. It heats them to fusion conditions.


10. This idea is very new. Many problems and unknowns remain. Much more research is needed. Here are just three.

11. The first is radiation losses. As the plasma heats up it loses more energy as light. This hurts the machine. One solution is keeping the electrons cold and the ions hot. But how this will work is unknown.

12. A second problem is Ion injection. We need to control ion focus, acceleration or formation. A millimeter to the left or right and the ion experiences a completely different acceleration. Methods for control are not fully understood.

13. A third problem is well preservation. The positives and negatives like to mix together. This makes it hard to concentrate all the charge in one place. This means holding the electric field needed for fusion is hard to do, overtime.

14. These and many other problems face the Polywell. Lots of work is needed to figure out if this can be a cheap source for green energy.

15. Thanks for watching!

KitemanSA
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Re: We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by KitemanSA »

It should start out more like

Fusion is easy. It is breaking even that is the hard part.
Fusion is so easy that basement tinkerers and high school kids have been doing it for decades.

This it the easy fusion device they all use. It consists of:
A vacuum chamber... a small and a large globe of wire grid that fit inside the chamber... a high voltage power source like from an old tube type TV... and a bit of deuterium that you can buy on ebay (or from a chemical shop ;); and various odds and ends of high voltage electrical stuff.

The unit is assembled like this with the inner grid charged negative and the outer charged positive.

This is a Hirsh Farnsworth Fusor.

It works like this.
...

mattman
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Re: We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by mattman »

Introduction

Image

1. There is an easy way to fuse atoms. It is called a fusor. The Polywell is a re-imagined fusor.

Image

2. The fusor uses to wire cages, one inside the other, to fuse atoms.

Image

3. A negative voltage is applied between the cages.

Image

4. When positive ions enter the cage they fall towards the center. If they hit in the center, they can fuse. The electric field is doing work on the ions heating them to fusion conditions.


Part 1: The Machine

Image

1. The Polywell is a new kind of fusor. Instead of a cage, it traps electrons using six electromagnets in a box.

Image

2. There are four interesting points in these machines: the axis (pause) the corner (pause) the joint (pause) and the center.

Image

3. Each ring is a coil of copper wiring inside a smooth steel shell. These are electromagnets. Each has a north and south pole.

Image

4. Each pole faces into the center.

Image

5. This is an image of the magnetic field.

Image

6. This creates a magnetic field pressure inside the rings. This pressure can contain electrons and ions. Tokomaks use similar fields.

Image

7. Outside the rings is a cage.

Image

8. This cage is charged negative to the rings.

Image

9. When everything is switched on there is a magnetic and electric field inside the machine.

Part 2: Operation

Image

1. Once the fields are working, electrons are released. They fly towards the rings.

Image

2. The magnetic fields overpower the electric fields and the electrons are caught.

Image

3. They start to corkscrew along the magnetic field lines and pass into the center. In the center there is a null point which can scatter them. They head to the corners and hit a dense field. They are reflected and trapped.

Image

4. Electrons move back and forth inside the rings. They move straight through the null point in the center. As they move they lose energy as light.

Image

5. Overtime electrons are lost. Extending trapping is key challenge.

Image

6. When billions of electrons are trapped they make a negative cloud in the center. This cloud may look like a 14 point star. Each "spike" in the star would be pointed to the sides and corners of the rings.

Image

7. This cloud makes a large electric field. This field accelerates ions to fusion conditions. When the ions hit in the center they can fuse.

Image

8. Once electrons are trapped, Deuterium gas is puffed in. Because it is uncharged, the gas crosses to the rings without problems.

Image

9. When it reaches the edge of the cloud it exchanges energy with the electrons. It ionizes. The ion falls towards the center. When they hit, they can fuse. The electric field is doing work on the ions. It heats them to fusion conditions.



Part 3: Considerations

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1. The machine loses energy by conduction. This is when mass touches a metal surface and is conducted away. The energy leaves with the mass.

Image

2. The machine losses energy by radiation. This is when energy leaves the center as light.

Image

3. As the plasma heats up it loses more energy as light.

Image

4. One way to reduce radiation losses is keeping the electrons cold and the ions hot. But how this will work is unknown.

Image

5. Energy can be captured using the heat cycle or direct conversion. Direct conversion is a new way to capture energy. It has shown a 48% efficiency.

Image

6. Each of these rates can be combined into the equation for net power. This equation will drive these machines.

Image

7. This idea is very new. Many problems and unknowns remain. Much more research is needed.

Image

8. We need to control ion focus, acceleration or formation. A millimeter to the left or right and the ion experiences a completely different acceleration. Methods for control are not fully understood.

Image

9. A third problem is well preservation. The positives and negatives like to mix together. This makes it hard to concentrate all the charge in one place. This means holding the electric field needed for fusion is hard to do, overtime.



Part 4: Frequently Asked Questions

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Question: Won't the ions and electrons recombine?

Image

Answer: The ionization energy of deuterium is 16 eV. As long as the plasma is hotter than that it will remain fully ionized.

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Question: Is there a limit to how much charge you can fit in the center?

Image

Answer: Yes, there is. It is called the Brillouin limit. It places a limit as to how many net electrons we can pack in the center. But so far, these machine have not come close to the limit.

Image

5. Question: Why can’t you simulate this?

----

6. Answer: billions of electrons behave very differently than a single electron. Simulations need to be improved to deal with this.


Part 5: Conclusions

Image

1. These and many other problems face the Polywell. Lots of work is needed to figure out if this can be a cheap source for green energy. Thanks for watching!
Last edited by mattman on Mon May 20, 2013 4:02 pm, edited 8 times in total.

D Tibbets
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Re: We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by D Tibbets »

Use of relative terms would perhaps be less confusing. The Faraday cage/ vacuum vessel wall is charged relatively negative to the positively charged grid, though absolute potential of the cage has been at Earth ground. If the cage is modified to a direct conversion series of grids this would change some.

A misconception (at least by my understanding) is the representation of electrons traveling radially with spirals along convex field lines. This is totally wrong for regions inside the Wiffleball border. The plasma is not magnatized. As I have pointed out, at the Wiffleball border the gradient of the B field is tremendous, changing from near zero to close to the B field near the magnent can surface. This means that the gradient in the B field in this region changes tremendously relatively to the associated average gyroradius of an electron at maximum energy. This means that the radius of orbit of the electron at the border is very small on the outer side and very large on the inner side. This means that the motion will assume a highly elliptical or parabolic shape. On the outside of the border the gyro radius may be ~ 1 mm, while on the inside of the border the radius may be many meters. This means that the electron effectively bounces / reflects off of the border after completing ~ 1/2 of an orbit), thus using terms like bouncing off of a wall, while a simplification, is much more descriptive than considering mirroring along a field line. Mirroring along a field line can only happen in a magnatized plasma and this may occur deep in cusps, and with some upscattered electrons (because they penetrate to B field regions where the field line gradient is much less) . Still in cusps much of the reversal (in the radial direction) of the electrons may be due to rebounding off of the high B field surface on each side of the cusp, and ricocheting to the opposite side of the cusp until it passes through the cusp or the sum of the rebounding angles results in the electron traveling back towards the center.
My understanding of the non magnetic plasma in the center is based on the relatively long gyro radius of the electrons on the inner side of the Wiffleball border. This radial length is greater than the machine diameter and local interactions (collisions) greatly dominate the electrons behavior in this region. Any Magrid induced magnetic 'memory ' is totally lost on each pass (the collionless equivalent of one parabolic magneticlly induced orbit). Thus use of term non magnetic plasma. In a collisionless plasma this may not be as dominate, but that requires densities much less than what is in a useful Polywell.

The representation of the average ion energy being much more than the electron energy bugs me also. Note the use of AVERAGE energy . The KE of the ions equals the KE of the electrons on average. The accelerating potential well is the same for both, just with reversed signs. The system is DYNAMIC (as Bussard liked to emphasize). In the center the ion KE is much greater than the electron KE, on the edge the reverse is true. Over the entire volume of the Wiffleball confined volume the average energy of both is equal- in fact I think saying otherwise would require exotic physics or some selective energy input that effects only one species without effecting the overall potential well.

Note that having the same average energy overall, but distinct separation depending on the radius you are referencing has significant consequences on the energy distribution of each species along with density (particles / unit area/ unit time). This effects things like Bremmstruhlung and confinement issues. In the patent application it is mentioned that the core ion pressure would seemingly require an equivalent electron pressure at the Wiffleball border, but because of dynamic interactions the electron pressure at the Wiffleball border does not need to be tremendous (with opposing tremendous magnetic field strength) in order to contain useful ion densities at a given ion fusion inducing energy (core ion energy).

So your graph is reasonable in the core region, but this must be balanced with another graph of the ion verses electron KE (temperature) in the border region. This is why some graphs shows both the ion and electron energies versus the radius. The slopes are opposite, and the net effect is the same total volume averaged energy for both.

Dan Tibbets
To error is human... and I'm very human.

ladajo
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Re: We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by ladajo »

I think you need to take an intermediate step once you go from Fusor to Polywell.

Transition with the reason Fusors don't work. (Wire in the way).

Point out that the 'Big Idea' of a Polywell is to get rid of the central cage.

This is done making use of the fact that very low mass (e-)s are easily controlled with magnetic fields, just like in your Vacuum Tube TV if you still have one.

Then walk the dog to configure a Polywell. Two toroidal magnets opossing push (e-)s towards each other in the middle. Two more opposing pairs close the gaps, and then the last pair makes a 'magnetic box' that pushes (e-)s towards the center.

This has the effect of making a "virtual" cathode, by concentrating a relatively large amount of (e-)s in the center of the 'magnetic box'. Thus creating the same idea as a Fusor, but with no wire cage in the center.

Then transition to the rest. Ions (+)s are attracted to the "Big Minus" and can collide and Fuse, just like in a Fusor, but without hitting the now non-existant center cage.
The development of atomic power, though it could confer unimaginable blessings on mankind, is something that is dreaded by the owners of coal mines and oil wells. (Hazlitt)
What I want to do is to look up C. . . . I call him the Forgotten Man. (Sumner)

KitemanSA
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Re: We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by KitemanSA »

Concur, except introduce Elmore Tuck Watson with virtual cages. Problem is now ELECTRONS run into grid. Can protect grid against ELECTRONS with magnets. >>> Polywell. Show initial octahedral configuration.

ladajo
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Re: We need a new film on YouTube explaining the Polywell.

Post by ladajo »

Good point, thanks Kite.
The development of atomic power, though it could confer unimaginable blessings on mankind, is something that is dreaded by the owners of coal mines and oil wells. (Hazlitt)
What I want to do is to look up C. . . . I call him the Forgotten Man. (Sumner)

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