Saturday, December 27, 2008

Steampunk Fusion Video


I got this video from Popular Science where you can read an interesting article on the subject. At Steampunk Fusion I have a look at whether this is a scam or could it really work. The short version: the engineering is very difficult but it could work.

Cross Posted at Classical Values

1 comment:

Jim Bowery said...

This is reminiscent of the adiabatic compression PLASMAK(tm) proposed by Paul Koloc. Unfortunately, when I investigated his experimental claims it turns out that the evidence for plasmoid formation was almost certainly a CCD clocking artifact. Specifically, there was a 3 video frame sequence supposedly showing a roughly diamond shaped "plasmoid" moving from the plasma "gun" toward the camera -- which would indicate a stability long enough to support Koloc's model of ball lightning. Unfortunately, subsequent experiments were able to replicate this diamond-shaped artifact and make it go off to the side of the plasma "gun" by simply turning the camera on its side. Moreover, the 3 frame sequence was not, in fact a sequence, as I discovered when digitizing the original videotape. Instead, the 3 frames were from 3 separate shots of the plasma gun.

In any event, the idea of taking a spheromak type plasmoid, as I presume these guys are talking about in their proposal, and compressing it is plausible since the Lawson criteria may be reduced to dimensions of pressure.

I'd like to see Art Carleson's critique of their technology.