Abstract
Gas spark closing switch is one of the most important components for a fast linear transformer driver (FLTD). In this paper, we describe the investigation of insulation gas media for a multi-gap multi-channel gas spark closing switch. A six-gap gas switch with corona needles was tested in a typical FLTD brick with two capacitors of 40 nF and a load resistor of about 10 Ω. Corona discharge current, self-breakdown voltage distribution, and triggered breakdown performance were tested when the gas switch was filled with air, N2, CO2, SF6/N2, and C4F7N/N2. When C4F7N/N2 was applied, there was no abnormal breakdown with low voltage found in the whole test process; the trigger breakdown delay time and switch jitter were very stable, and no pre-fire was found during about 2000 triggered shots. Therefore, we think the C4F7N/N2 gas mixture with a very little amount of C4F7N can dramatically improve the switch performance. It is valuable and easy to realize the application of C4F7N/N2 mixture in large scale pulsed power facilities.
Highlights
Fast linear transformer driver (FLTD) is one of the developing direct drive technologies to generate high voltage high current pulse with a rise-time of 100 ns or so. It is of much importance for x-ray flash photography, Z-Pinch, inertial confinement fusion (ICF), etc
It is noticeable that the slope of the I-U curves in pure N2 is obviously steeper than other gas media. This means that the corona discharge in air, CO2, SF6/N2, and C4F7N/N2 is more stable than in pure N2
We presented a comparison study of several gas media of a six-gap multi-gap multi-channel gas switch (MMGS) for FLTD
Summary
Fast linear transformer driver (FLTD) is one of the developing direct drive technologies to generate high voltage high current pulse with a rise-time of 100 ns or so. Gas spark switches for FLTD are required to be fired with high stability and reliability under a charge voltage of ±100 kV, peak conducting current of tens of kiloamperes, lifetime of the order of 107, pre-fire probability of the order of 10−6, repetitive rate of 0.1 Hz, and so on.. Gas spark switches for FLTD are required to be fired with high stability and reliability under a charge voltage of ±100 kV, peak conducting current of tens of kiloamperes, lifetime of the order of 107, pre-fire probability of the order of 10−6, repetitive rate of 0.1 Hz, and so on.6–8 To satisfy these strict requirements, a compact three-electrode gas switch, UV pre-ionization gas switch, plasma injection gas switch, multi-gap multi-channel gas switch (MMGS), etc., have been proposed and investigated in recent years. In this paper, we focus on the corona discharge characteristics and firing performance of a MMGS in different gas media, aiming to find the best choice of gas medium for the MMGS with corona needles
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