Irradiation lifetimes of carbon stripper foils made by cracking ethylene in a glow discharge

Abstract

Irradiation lifetimes of carbon stripper foils made by cracking ethylene in a DC glow discharge are reported. A beam of 1.2 MeV Ar + ions was used and lifetimes were compared with those for foils made by the carbon arc process. The thicker ethylene foils (15–30 μg cm −2) lasted more than 20 times longer than the carbon arc foils while the thinner ones (5–10 μg cm −2) lasted 9 times longer. A further factor of 1.8 improvement was obtained for thicker foils by mechanically slackening them before irradiation. Possible reasons for the differences in lifetime are discussed.