Velocities of copper and silver ions generated from an impulse vacuum arc

Author

Tsuruta, Koichi ; Sekiya, Kyohei ; Watanabe, Gin-ichi

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. & Electron. Eng., Ibaraki Univ., Japan

Volume

25

Issue

4

fYear

1997

fDate

8/1/1997 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

603

Lastpage

608

Abstract

Vacuum gaps with copper and silver needle cathodes were fired by a 13 μs duration half-cycle sinusoidal arc, and charge states of the ions were analyzed using the time of flight (TOF) method at different positions in the direction perpendicular to the electrode axis. Velocities of each charge state ion were determined assuming a collisionless flight from the cathode region to the outside of the gap. The velocities of the fastest ions of copper and silver are 2.1 and 1.6×10⁴ m/s, respectively, regardless of the charge state. The velocities of the ions released with the arc extinction are lower, and differ depending on the state of the charge

Keywords

copper; plasma diagnostics; silver; time of flight spectra; vacuum arcs; velocity; Ag; Ag ions; Cu; Cu ions; arc extinction; cathode region; charge states; collisionless flight; half-cycle sinusoidal arc; impulse vacuum arc; needle cathodes; time of flight method; vacuum gaps; velocity; Acceleration; Accelerometers; Cathodes; Copper; Electrodes; Pulse circuits; Silver; Time measurement; Vacuum arcs; Vacuum breakdown;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Plasma Science, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0093-3813

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/27.640672

Filename

640672