Measurement of the expansion velocity of the plasma high-current vacuum arc discharge

Abstract

In this work, we present experimental results on measuring the velocity of vacuum arc discharge plasma expansion. In the experiments, two designs of plasma guns were used. In the first version, the end of the arc discharge cathode was located below the plane of the anode, and the surface of the insulator separating them was parallel to the axis of symmetry of the plasma gun. In this design, the arc discharge plasma escapes the anode through a hole, the diameter of which coincides with the diameter of the cathode. In the second variant, the plane of the end face of the arc discharge cathode coincided with the plane of the anode, and the surface of the insulator separating them was located perpendicular to the axis of symmetry of the plasma gun. To obtain an image of plasma in the optical range, an FER-7 optical streak camera was used. Based on the results obtained, it can be concluded that the expansion velocity of the plasma of a high-current vacuum arc discharge does not depend on the design of the guns considered in this experiment.