extreme currents
Added 2025-08-31 16:34:53 +0000 UTCThere have been many new problems as well as interesting discoveries this week! I've also had a big breakthrough. There is a lot to cover.
C-clamps are useless for most things on the yeet blocks, but the one thing they can (sometimes) hold is stranded cable. The reason is that the ends are spread out to the point where they are cooled on the block, and the part that explodes is outside of the grip of the clamp. Using c-clamped 4/0 copper cable as the load, I finally got the switch to fail, clocking 89,000 amps. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6i-WaXQeTU
I was able to get slow mo of the failure too, and it seemed the issue was magnetic, so I rewired the switch from an X shaped configuration to a Z shaped configuration (first pic). Now instead of magnetic forces being repulsive on the plates, there is a component of force that is attractive.
The new configuration did not seem to improve things by that much, although the switch now oscillated much faster and more violently. The plasma leaving the switch was clearly hotter and faster, seen by pic 2.
After a couple more runs, I realized something incredible. There was a hole being drilled near the center of both plates! (pic 3) I made a z-pinch!!! The currents were constricting to a tiny region, forming an ultra hot plasma bubble that was being trapped by the plates, which would cause an explosion that would separate the contacts.
I needed a way to vent the plasma, so as a proof of concept, I "welded" 4 strips of 4/0 copper along the switch plates. (pic 4). I zapped another piece of cable on the yeet blocks, and it sounded like a bomb. The cable was squeezed into a smaller diameter, and the yeet blocks ripped the bolts through the wood blocks. Yet, I only clocked 94,000 amps. (pic 5)
Then I realized, the cable exploded in roughly 70ms. It should take 200ms at that current according to the Onderdonk equation. My current sensor was probably saturating! I removed four of the five cables from the sensor, and started blowing up more cable. Most times the switch had issues due to the workaround I was using, but then I finally got a fairly clean shot at the end of the night. 138,000 amp peak!! (pic 6)
I'm confident 150,000 amps is possible on this setup now, but I need to come up with a more reliable way to switch that kind of current. I also need a way to hold things on the yeet blocks that aren't stranded cable. I am happy with the currents I'm obtaining now though, so the most important goal of all has been achieved!
Comments
As for holding the victims at the yeet plates, I can't really think of another solution than to use some kind of heat resistant mesh net (or fabric) to hold them down under tension. For the tension maybe you could raise the wooden board to which the copper plates are attached to and then mount the mesh to a new board that lies beneath the one you have and have some spring in between. A fixed spring would make it a pain to change objects but you could possibly use air dampeners that you can fill with a simple bicycle pump (though preferably a compressor). Key thing is that whatever is holding the objects down are under flexible tension and the greater the surface area that cover the objects over the plates the less they will shrink at a specific point, I guess?
Patrik
2025-09-03 17:38:17 +0000 UTCAlso it's interesting that you seemed to have achieved the highest current with the smallest area of contact on the switch if I understood you correctly (after the weld). If that's the case the big block is probably just working against you due to imperfections growing which causes (not really oscillations, though these night occur from other forces) but rather just an unstable delivery as it works through the imperfections upon closure. Hard to figure out a solution without access to like a CNC machine that could carve out holes in what would be the center position if the switch were closed, both horizontally and vertically and then having one side of the switch on a 2dimensional pivot. Would also be cool do just have one hole on the middle and see if you can make the plasma launch upwards in a concentrated stream. Sorry for wall of text can't figure out how to make line breaks from mobile
Patrik
2025-09-03 16:32:06 +0000 UTC
