Posted on 07/27/2009 6:46:22 AM PDT by Wonder Warthog
The boys at Talk Polywell have uncovered the details of the WB-8 contract [pdf]. Those details can give us some insight into how WB-7 has gone. From the looks of things - rather well.
The current effort will build on what has been completed under these previous contracts as well as requirements to provide the Navy with data for potential applications of AGEE with a delivered item, wiffleball 8 (WB8) and options for a modified wiffleball 8 (WB8.1) and modified ion gun. The objective of this procurement is validation of the basic physics of the AGEE concept as well as requirements to provide the Navy with data for potential applications of AGEE. It builds upon previous concept-demonstration bench top versions of plasma wiffleballs. As such, it comes under the FAR 35.001 definition of applied research. The contract will be for a wiffleball 8 with 2 options for modifications to the wiffleball based upon it’s success.
OK. They are going into deeper validation. Which means WB-7 went OK.
3.1.1 The Contractor shall construct and test a small-scale MG Insulated, Wiffleball Polyhedral Device, WB8. WB8 shall be built based on results of WB7 (built under contract N68936-03-C-0031) and shall utilize design and performance knowledge gained from test of prior WB machines.
3.1.2 The design shall use circular coils around each main face cusp axis. The device shall use emitter electron gun arrays and an ion beam drive. The machine will be operated in magnetic fields with pulsed currents. WB8 shall be operated at a magnetic field strength of approximately 0.8 Tesla, which represents an increase of 8 times the magnetic field strength of previous WB machines. Improvements over previous WB machines in WB confinement, ion energy and fusion reactivity are expected as a result of these changes to WB machine design.
3.1.3 Within 20 days of completion of testing of the WB8, the contractor shall deliver a report detailing the results of the experimental testing of this MG Insulated, Wiffleball Polyhedral Device, WB8. The report shall provide sufficient information to guide programmatic and design decisions about further, refined design efforts for similar devices. The report shall address the plasma dynamics of WB devices, and shall address the scaling laws that apply to polywell fusion. (A001)
Circular coils means that there will be no significant change in geometry. That is good. Apples to apples comparisons. An increase of field strength by a factor of 8 means - if the scaling laws hold a factor of about 4,000 increase in power out. If WB-7 was similar to WB-6 it means an increase from 3 neutrons a shot to 12,000. A real countable number i.e the error bars will be much lower. A count of 3 can actually be considered a count of 3 +/-2. That is a big error bar. For 12,000 the error bar is on the order of +/-100 about 1%. That makes improvements or degradations of 5% easily detectable. Where as in the first situation (WB-6/7) changes that doubled or halved the output rate would be hard to detect.
3.1.4 Within 30 days of build and test of WB8, the contractor shall provide a predictive model of WB behavior including data points for detailed 2D/3D profile measurements of plasma density, ion energy and WB magnetic field structure during follow-on tests to validate the scientific basis for a Polywell fusion power reactor, and guide further research. The contractor shall coordinate with the Government for a program review meeting at the contractor’s facilities to be held no later than 40 days after the testing of the WB8 and shall provide the detailed predictive model and data points at this program review meeting.
3.1.5 The contractor shall deliver a periodic progress report specifying status information of the experimental testing of the MG Insulated, Wiffleball Polyhedral Device, WB8. (A002)
The magnetic profile of an operating device is critical for knowing how the device actually operates. Without that it is very difficult if not impossible to design in improvements.
3.1.6 The contractor shall deliver a conceptual design for a follow-on fusion demonstration device, WB-9. Conceptual studies will focus on the feasibility of extending the WB-8 results to this device and determining the suitability of this concept as a fusion reactor. This design will be delivered at the end of the contract.
So the program is starting to take on a life of its own. A WB-9 device is already under consideration even before experiments on WB-8 are even completed. This indicates a fair amount of confidence in the forthcoming results. Excellent.
Now here comes what I consider the most critical requirement of WB-8testing.
3.2.1 Enhanced Ion Drive with PB11 (proton/boron 11): Based on the results of WB8 testing, and the availability of government funds the contractor shall develop a WB machine (WB8.1) which incorporates the knowledge and improvements gained in WB8. It is expected that higher ion drive capabilities will be added, and that a “PB11” reaction will be demonstrated. The contractor shall investigate and validate the plasma scaling laws with respect to B-field, voltage and reactor size. The contractor shall investigate the feasibility of a neutron-free fusion power reaction using a polywell WB machine. It is anticipated that improvements in WB confinement, ion energy, and fusion reactivity will be demonstrated in WB8.1. Improvements over the WB8 predictive, computational model are expected, which should yield a better understanding of the WB fusion reaction thus allowing optimization of the WB machine.
3.2.2 The contractor shall deliver a report detailing the results of the experimental testing of WB8.1. The report shall provide sufficient information to guide programmatic and design decisions about further, refined design efforts for similar devices. The report shall address the plasma dynamics of WB devices, and shall address the scaling laws that apply to polywell fusion, and the feasibility of the PB11 reaction. The report shall address the conceptual requirements for a polywell fusion reactor capable of generating approximately 100mW. (A0001)
3.2.3 Within 30 days of testing, the contractor shall update the predictive computer model of WB behavior created under paragraph 3.1.4 using the PB11 reaction and shall deliver the model within 30 days of completion of initial tests specified in paragraph 3.2.1.
The fact that they are contemplating work on the pB11 reaction is very encouraging. That fuel is one of the most difficult to burn in a fusion reactor. Which means testing with lesser fuels (or simulated fuels) has gone very well indeed.
At 100 milliwatts for a follow on reactor they are starting to get into the power range. If they can get that kind of power with .3 m dia. coils and .8 T fields, then a reactor with 3 m coils and 10 T fields should produce about 2.5 Mega Watts if the scaling laws hold.
And just as a little kicker:
3.3.1 The contractor shall develop an enhanced ion drive system that is compatible with Wiffleball 8.1 and projected future wiffleballs. The ion drive system shall be capable of injecting protons (ionized Hydrogen), and ionized Boron 11. The ion drive system shall be capable of generating ions in sufficient quantity to fully fuel the wiffleball fusion machines.
If they are going to fuel even a small machine the ion guns are going to have to be capable of multi amp currents - each.
Well that is my first cut at digesting the news. If you want to figure out more a look at all the links at Talk Polywell will be helpful. I especially liked this inventory [pdf] of items purchased since about 1999.
All in all the new contract has a lot of good news. To sum up:
What it means about past work: it went well. What it means for the future: verifying engineering rules More: there is a plan to test the Hydrogen/Boron 11 fuel combination More: They must be confident of results since they are planning a WB-9
You can learn the basics of fusion energy by reading Principles of Fusion Energy: An Introduction to Fusion Energy for Students of Science and Engineering
Polywell is a little more complicated. You can learn more about Polywell and its potential at: Bussard's IEC Fusion Technology (Polywell Fusion) Explained
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/06/fusion_energy.html
Forum software forces me to post this in the “Bloggers” section, but this is NEWS of the first order. Mods are asked to so move the post.
Synopsizing it with a sentence on what the hell it’s actually talking about would probably save a lot of headaches. As it is, it just looks like someone tore a couple pages out of a high energy physics journal and posted them...
Yeah, only science geeks are likely to understand this at first "pop", but the links in comments can get a generally intelligent reader "up to speed".
It is actually quite rude too. It is like speaking Spanish in a group of English speakers when you can also speak English. That’s always been a pet peeve of mine.
>>but the links in comments can get a generally intelligent reader “up to speed”. <<
How about us not so generally intelligent? ;-)
So it’s a flux capacitor?
Nah. It's the gizmo the POWERS the flux capacitor (Mr. Fusion).
This is great news.
The Polywell is the only Nuclear energy device that’s actually working and scalable. Once it’s scaled up to full size, it’s a quick few steps to making cheap and clean electricity.
I understood everything here without even looking at it ....
keep in mind that at 100 milliwatts for a follow on reactor they are starting to get into the power range. If they can get that kind of power with .3 m dia. coils and .8 T fields, then a reactor with 3 m coils and 10 T fields should produce about 2.5 Mega Watts if the scaling laws hold.
“If WB-7 was similar to WB-6 it means an increase from 3 neutrons a shot to 12,000. A real countable number i.e the error bars will be much lower. A count of 3 can actually be considered a count of 3 +/-2. That is a big error bar.”
Paydirt for Polywell, isn’t the same thing as a revolutionary new power generator for the rest of us. I mean, I’m glad the results are good enough to proceed. That said, this is make or break time. If the scaling model is wrong, then this is another cold fusion mess. Good luck to the team.
Well, I’ll give Wonder a “buy” on this one ‘cause of the way-cool factor.
That said, it’s always an obligation of us science types to throw in a layman paragraph and/or define all the acronyms that tend to litter technical documents. I’m in the habit of generally doing so with respect to the latter because we have to do it in all of our reports.
Well, I would say that the fact that the Navy is planning to explore PB11 that the results must have been "really, really good". And no, it won't be "another cold fusion mess", at worst it will be on a par with the Tokamak. Nebel has been VERY careful to do peer review.
>>Nah. It’s the gizmo the POWERS the flux capacitor (Mr. Fusion). <<
Ooooo, you got it!
I guess smart people watch old movies too.
Anyway, thanks for the article and explanation (even more). My nine year old would probably understand what’s going on here (yes, I’m pushing her toward Science) but it’s a bit over my head.
I hope this works. I’m tired of 200.00 electric bills.
Ping of interest
I didn’t have any trouble noodling it out after reading the whole thing and going back over some stuff, but there’s plenty of folks here who’d appreciate the “meat” of this story without having to open a simultaneous window to a search engine and spending an hour looking up stuff like mW, Teslas, etc...
I only nitpick on the subject because it’s the primary reason that people outside of the hard sciences dislike and mistrust scientists. You either get painted the elitist, or on the other hand some bozo in the media takes the core concept and runs off on some crazy tangent with it.
Technical concepts can usually be broken down and reasonably explained to the layperson with a little effort on our part and that effort is usually rewarded with greater respect and a piquing of interest on their part.
Well, it was either post it with minimal comments, or wait 'til the weekend to get the time to assemble such a commentary. I figured getting it out ASAP would be preferable, even if "rough".
I prefer WD-40.
I was joking about understanding it....
I still think it is about toy death rays or possibly lizard people that eat anti-matter
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