Publications Details

Characterization of the Redesigned Extended MITL for HERMES III

Powell, Troy C.; Cartwright, Keith C.; Biller, Andrew C.; Pointon, Timothy D.

Modeling and simulation of the legacy HERMES III Magnetically Insulated Transmission Line (MITL) has been performed using EMPHASIS, an unstructured time-domain electromagnetic (UTDEM) particle-in-cell (PIC) simulation software. This design when used lost roughly half of its current before the pulse reached the load. The cause of the current loss in the MITL was found to be the vacuum impedance changes along the MITL. The MITL was then redesigned to maintain constant impedance and simulated in EMPHASIS once again. Following predicting simulation results, the new MITL was then built, installed, and tested, showing minimal current loss and good agreement with simulation and theoretical results, all of which are reported here. Additionally, an analysis of experimental voltage calculation techniques using cathode and anode currents is performed and compared to simulation results.