Hi again from downunder...

[Steven Sesselmann]

Hi Guys, I'm not excactly new here, but havent been in for a while, main reason is I have not had a lab and haven't had too much to report. Things are now looking better and I am building myself a new lab. I managed to rescue most of the bits and pieces from the old lab, so it shouldn't take as long as last time.

The project I am starting on is called F.I.C.S. Fusion (Fusion Induced Charge Separation), the theory behind F.I.C.S. is totally different to IEC fusion, allthough the apparatus is somewhat similar, F.I.C.S. fusion operates more like a fuel cell than a collider, and if it works as anticipated, it will actually produce a useful current. More on that later...

When I am not tinkering with fusion, I am probably working on gamma spectrometry or building my GS-1100A, this was a product that came about as a result of a need, after a friend of mine Marek Dolleiser wrote a fantastic software called PRA (Pulse Recorder and Analyser). Using some clever programming, Marek managed to convert the sound card in a normal PC into an excellent Gamma Spectrum Analyser, but to use it with a NaI detector one needed a power supply, a pre-amp and some decoupling, so I designed the USB powered GS-1100A "Gamma Spectacular".

At $249.00 the GS-1100A was an instant success, and within 12 months I had sold over 200 around the world, including Japan, Sweden, France and Russia. See more about this product on my web site http://www.beeresearch/com.au

Okay, we chat later, I think I have enough material to inside my head, to turn physics on it's head

Steven

[Starfire]

Welcome Steven and good luck with the ' Fusion Induced Charge Separation ' such different approach is refreshing and important - also with the GS-1100A it is refreshing to know that new ideas are being pursued.

Many try's - few successes!

[Doug Coulter]

Welcome back, Steven!

We're pretty friendly to alternate fusion approaches around here, and it sounds like you're onto one I had not anticipated - let me know if we need to create a new category for it. It's great news that you're going back into action with a lab again! I'm a big believer in the idea that actions speak loudest, and that nothing beats a guess like a real test.

For those who haven't been following too closely, I've recently ditched further development on "normal" fusors myself, keeping one as a test source for detectors, to move on to other learning tools. I basically reached the conclusion that fusors as currently built are "done" - stick a fork in it and take it out of the oven - we've all independently reached the same "great attractor" sweet spot, which my investigations seem to say is actually the most stable, but worst for fusion Q -- almost any perturbation improves things in my setup, creating bursts of much higher Q in unstable modes. Since this "emergent complex behavior of a supposedly simple system" is too complex for decent modeling or quick understanding, I've decided to simplify and learn a few more things before moving on in that space, and am heading toward beam devices for further study for the next leg of my own journey.

I'm glad to hear I'm not alone in that outlook. Plain old fusors seem to have become sort of like like restoring old hot rods - fun for old farts, a fun way to get new kids into the game, but not the pointy end of the spear going forward. Eyes on the prize - not the method, but the desired result!

I too have had some recent insights re the fact that fusors may not be the best way to satisfy the overlooked conservation laws that must apply to the reactions we want to create -- CPT conservation is well accepted in general atomic science, but ignored by fusioneers, and to me it looks like a fusor is actually trying to break that rule and others for some reactions - that's not going to fly - there are no other hints that those rules don't apply elsewhere in science. I plan to do something about that, or at least learn why I can't. I figure beam devices, being simpler and temporarily forgetting about recirculation (eg removing the recursive/fractal/re-thermalizing aspect) will be the quickest way to learn some things I want to get a better handle on.

We're also doing some products here (DJ's) that attempt to help amateur scientists and don't have any objection to others also doing so -- the more the merrier, the point is to help the community get on with what they want to investigate - and realize that not everyone can be expert at everything, so we can help one another. Our current main product is the standard counter and software which runs off USB and will eventually be multi-platform - Since you're an Apple guy, you might be the one to add that platform, since the PC-side code is Perl, which runs nicely on Apples, I'm told (it all being *nix, more or less). I just don't happen to have a Mac here - I'm a Linux guy, having ditched Windows when I stopped getting paid to fix its flaws for a living.

We'll be eager to hear what you have come up with as a new approach -- we have a lot of categories to talk about things (and both theory and practice have their own places), don't be afraid to use the newtopic button, and if you can't find a place something would fit, let me know, and I'll create a place. We'll never get science all sorted into pigeonholes, but we try as best we can so we can find things again later.

[Steven Sesselmann]

Thanks Doug, thanks John,

I will soon reveal how and why F.I.C.S. fusion will work. I think Doug might have been pretty close to figuring it out himself, with his two gridded fusor, but possibly failed to see the solution

John was also instrumental and helped me understand the importance of potential and charge, it's all relative.

When you arrange your ions the right way, they will want to fuse, just like water wants to run down hill.

Smashing nuclei together to generate fusion is a misunderstanding of the fusion process, the outcome can in some cases be a fusion reaction, but the smashing was not the main reason.

Steven

[Doug Coulter]

Actually, what happened with the two grid thing was a quick realization that even the one grid thing had complexity I'd not yet learned to handle, and the equipment for what I wanted to do, shepherding ions through a two grid system was at the time, out of my reach, though I got a start on it, and am still discussing some aspects -- right now with new member Crispin.

I agree that smashing ions together to get fusion is a lot like smashing humans together (say, shot from cannons) to get babies. There's these important other little details that also have to be right, not just proximity (see above for a couple). With humans, kinda helps of they're opposite sex, fertile, and a few other minor details. Else you waste a lot of powder in cannons for not much yield. Head to head end on doesn't work so well -- only a couple possible configs work. Same with nuclei, we know this already, but seem to persist in just doing the thing with cannons, or putting a bunch in a box and shaking the snot out of the box (tokomak).

And what's face-palm stupid is that accepted science has known all this for ages, but basic obvious, tested, science I learned decades ago hasn't made it onto the fusion community. Heck, I didn't even realize it till recently.

[Steven Sesselmann]

I agree that smashing ions together to get fusion is a lot like smashing humans together (say, shot from cannons) to get babies. There's these important other little details that also have to be right, not just proximity (see above for a couple). With humans, kinda helps of they're opposite sex, fertile, and a few other minor details. Else you waste a lot of powder in cannons for not much yield. Head to head end on doesn't work so well -- only a couple possible configs work. Same with nuclei, we know this already, but seem to persist in just doing the thing with cannons, or putting a bunch in a box and shaking the snot out of the box (tokomak).

I like your analogy with humans

I was struck by a similar thought this morning, while discussing cosmology with a guy in Israel on the FocusFusion forum. What if when aliens came to earth, observing that these beings called humans are roughly spread evenly throughout the planet, but clustering together in random places, then measure the mass of each one finding that they are all of similar mass, and draw the conclusion that they must all have been created in a terrestrial event called the Big Bang!

This is not the forum to discuss it, so when I get a chance I shall hop on another forum and explain how protons and electrons came to be of different mass.

Cheers...

Steven