Re: americium 241

["Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>]

Original poster: "by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <cwillis-at-guilford.edu>


 It's an interesting idea.  I think you would decrease the firing voltage, but
at the same time, would ruin the insulating properties of the air while the
capacitors charge.  And you probably will need millicurie amounts or more to
see much effect- for any experiments I would recommend the cheap Po-210 in
"staticmaster" brushes, which have up to 500 microcuries of alpha activity and
can be bought at "SPI supplies" or elsewhere online.  No licenses are required.
Unfortunately the half-life is only 130 days or so!  Richard Hull's website has
photos of an alpha-particle spark-gap detector built by another Richmond
scientist that seems to indicate your idea would be useful.  Good luck.

-Carl

"Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
01/05/2002 07:55 PM MST

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Subject: americium 241


Original poster: "by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>"
<RQBauzon-at-aol-dot-com>

i was wondering if by attaching a chunk of americium 241 to my spark gap, i
could aid the ionization process thus yielding a higher break rate? or would
that just be defeating the purpose of quenching?