Background Pressure Effects on Internal and Near-Field Ion Velocity Distribution of the BHT-600 Hall Thruster

Abstract

Abstract : Presented is a study of the effects of chamber background pressure on the ion axial velocity distribution within the discharge chamber and in the near-field of the Busek BHT-HD-600 xenon Hall effect thruster. Ion velocity distributions were measured along the acceleration channel centerline using laser-induced fluorescence of the 5d[4](sub 7/2)-6p[3](sub 5/2) xenon ion excited state transition. Measurements were taken at the lowest possible chamber background pressure and a pressure that was a factor of two higher. In addition to varying the background pressure, the magnetic field of the discharge chamber was switched between two configurations. The radial magnetic was set to a low and high strength case, which produced two different anode current oscillatory regimes. Ion axial velocity distribution function peaks were used to approximate ion energy and axial electric field strength to compare the acceleration profiles of the tested thruster operating conditions. Increasing background pressure shifted the ion acceleration region upstream in the discharge chamber. The width of the velocity distributions correlated strongly to the radial magnetic field strength. The high magnetic field case data showed narrower peaks.