Glow discharge cleaning of vacuum switch tubes

To clean the surfaces of parts inside a vacuum-switch tube (VST) the authors propose a technique which generates a glow discharge between the inner electrodes and the copper grid surrounding it. Photographic observation reveals that the glow discharge spreads out and cleans the whole surface inside the VST. A breakdown test between the inner electrodes shows the effect of the cleaning with this technique. Higher breakdown voltage between the inner electrodes is attained by performing this glow discharge cleaning in argon rather than hydrogen gas. The difference of the cleaning effect seems to be attributed to that of the energy transfer from ion species to the adsorbed molecules and microprotrusions on the surfaces