After the 'Breaking Dawn' fusion experimental reactor was delivered to the Qixia Controlled Nuclear Fusion Engineering Base, Xu Chuan lived in the base's research institute and personally directed the assembly and modification of the experimental reactor.
The high-temperature copper-carbon-silver composite superconducting materials produced by Western Superconducting Group are processed into special shapes and sent to the warehouse of the engineering base.
This work was done in advance. When he decided to trade the ASDEX device during the Chinese New Year, he asked the Planck Institute for Plasma Research for information such as the detailed design drawings and structural diagrams of the ASDEX device.
The research team then conducted a design based on relevant information. The designed drawing data was immediately sent to the production line of Western Superconducting Group and processed into corresponding superconducting products. It was already delivered before the ASDEX device was shipped.
In the base.
According to the design drawings, the project base is brightly lit 24 hours a day and is busy working overtime.
In order to stably transform the ASDEX device into the 'Dawn Fusion Reactor', Xu Chuan did not leave the Qixia Mountain project base for more than a month, eating, drinking and eating inside.
However, this month-long busy work was worth it. After the August 1st Festival, as if it was specially given as a gift, the engineers of the Daybreak Project finally completed the assembly of the last set of coils after working around the clock.
.
In order to assemble high-temperature copper-carbon-silver composite superconducting materials into the original ASDEX device, Huaguo Nuclear Industry Construction Group erected a huge gantry of more than 20 meters in the core factory building, and provided strong magnetic fields in each group of superconducting gantry.
Corresponding fixing devices are also built on the outside of the guide assembly.
These fixtures firmly fix the superconducting components and the Daybreak fusion reactor in their starting positions to prevent displacement or other unexpected situations of the superconducting coils that provide a strong magnetic field.
After all, what is running in the controllable nuclear fusion reactor chamber is ultra-high temperature plasma with a temperature of hundreds of millions of degrees. If there is a deviation in the magnetic field control, I am afraid that the tragedy of Sakura Country will happen again.
This is also the reason why Xu Chuan required that the geology must be stable when selecting the site.
.......
After a month of hard work, the assembly and modification of the ASDEX device was finally completed.
Standing in front of the huge 'Breaking Dawn' fusion reactor, not only Xu Chuan, but also all the staff and researchers showed pride, hope, expectation, anticipation and other emotions in their eyes.
Fortunately, the work was successfully completed!
All that's left is to start the fusion reactor and enter the next stage of the journey after completing acceptance.
With a smile in his eyes, Xu Chuan glanced at the huge fusion reactor in front of him, looked at Academician Peng Hongxi standing next to him, and gave the order:
"Each team is ready to start checking the installation status of the Daybreak Fusion Device, report the situation in a timely manner, and start power-on operation according to the scheduled plan!"
After having been busy for such a long time and spending 300 million euros and huge efforts to buy back the ASDEX device, it is naturally impossible to let it sit idle here.
Strictly speaking, the first power-on operation is not an ignition operation experiment, it is just an acceptance after the assembly is completed.
As for the goal of acceptance, it is actually very simple.
The first is to check whether the assembled Dawn Fusion device can operate normally, including injecting certain raw materials inside and raising the temperature to control its operation.
The second is to confirm whether the external field coil made of high-temperature copper-carbon-silver composite superconducting material can normally provide a huge magnetic field exceeding 40T.
These two points are the goals for the first power-on operation, and the running time is not pursued.
As long as these two goals are achieved, it can be confirmed that the Dawn Fusion Device can start subsequent experiments.
If everything goes well, Xu Chuan is ready to officially start the first round of ignition operation experiments on a special day!
2020.10.01.
This year's National Day is quite special. It is not only the National Day, but also the Mid-Autumn Festival!
Country and family are reunited.
On a day like this, congratulating the country with a breakthrough in controllable nuclear fusion engineering is definitely one of the best things.
As for the time, it actually didn’t take long after all.
It is now close to mid-August, and there is still one and a half months left, during which acceptance testing and equipment maintenance and adjustments after testing will be carried out, etc.
Although it is not very tight, it is not loose either.
.......
After Xu Chuan issued the inspection order, the engineers of the Daybreak Fusion Device Engineering Team quickly started moving.
For him, checking the condition of the equipment is just a word of mouth, but in fact it is a quite tedious matter.
From the main body of the Dawn Fusion device, to the supercomputing center that provides computing power, to the liquid helium and liquid nitrogen equipment for cooling, to the stability of the power grid that provides electrical energy...and so on.
By the time the engineers from the fusion device engineering team completed all the inspection work at dawn, it was the fourth day after the order was issued.
In the underground core area where the Daybreak Fusion Device is installed, all staff working on the Qixia Mountain Controlled Nuclear Fusion Project are waiting at their posts.
Standing in the main control room, Xu Chuan looked down through the huge monitoring screen at the dawn fusion device lying quietly on the wide ground. The huge reactor was sleeping like a steel behemoth, just waiting for a chance to wake up.
Although this was not the first time he stood in this position, his heart was surging and beating like never before.
No one knew that he had been waiting for this moment for at least ten years.
Walking next to Xu Chuan, Han Jin, a student of Academician Peng Hongxi, who had previously been responsible for the "Nuclear Energy Beta Radiation Energy Concentration and Conversion to Electric Energy Mechanism" project, also joined the controllable nuclear fusion project as Peng Hongxi's assistant.
At this moment, he was responsible for conveying the report to Xu Chuan on behalf of Academician Peng Hongxi: "Academician Xu, a comprehensive inspection of the Daybreak Fusion Device has been completed. All equipment is normal and has no problems, and the acceptance experiment can be carried out."
After hearing Han Jin's report, Xu Chuan nodded, took a deep breath, and calmly gave the order: "Start powering on and running!"
As the order to start the experiment was issued, the staff in each group of control rooms quickly became busy.
External current is stably supplied to the Daybreak Fusion Device, and the pipeline valves connected to the storage of liquid nitrogen and liquid helium are opened, and ultra-low temperature liquid helium and liquid nitrogen flow to different areas through different pipelines.
The high-temperature copper-carbon-silver composite superconducting material deployed in the external field quickly reached the Tc critical temperature under the freezing of liquid nitrogen and liquid helium, just like in countless previous experiments.
With the continuous input of strong current, the current through the external superconducting coil begins to increase rapidly and steadily. With the "sizzling" sound of the strong current passing through the ordinary conductor, the external superconducting coil begins to transform into a superconducting state.
At the same time, the confinement magnetic field strength and various values of the Dawn Fusion Device fed back on the computer screen in the main control room began to rise continuously.
Seeing the constrained magnetic field rising all the way to 40T, Xu Chuan's tense face also brought a smile.
No matter how many times he had tested it before, no matter how many times he had used it in his previous life, when the high-temperature copper-carbon-silver composite superconducting material currently deployed in the Daybreak Fusion Equipment demonstrated its powerful performance as expected, he finally let go of what he had been thinking about.
Came down.
40.21T!
The magnetic field strength that binds the plasma is one of the keys to controlling ultra-high temperature and high pressure plasma turbulence in the controllable nuclear fusion reactor chamber.
By superimposing a magnetic field strength of one hundred Tesla, this is already 80,000 times the strength of the earth's magnetic field, and more than four times that of the original ASDEX device.
Such a huge confinement magnetic field can further and more effectively control the plasma in the reactor chamber.
"The steady-state magnetic field strength reached 40.21 Tesla, and the first phase acceptance goal was achieved!"
In the main control room, the staff rang loudly with trembling and excited reports.
Not only this young researcher, everyone in the control room had joy on their faces.
The steady-state magnetic field of 40.21T, alone, has broken the record of 25.72T of the most advanced all-superconducting tokamak nuclear fusion experimental device (EAST) in China.
In the main control room, Xu Chuan stood in front of the console. After confirming that there were no problems with the constrained magnetic field and other components, he took a deep breath and continued to issue instructions!
"Start the next acceptance phase and inject helium-3 into the Dawn Fusion Device!"
During the acceptance of a controllable nuclear fusion reactor, a trace amount of helium-3 gas is injected into the chamber, and then the temperature is continuously raised to heat it into plasma to verify whether the external confinement magnetic field can smoothly control the plasma in the reactor chamber.
Integrating raw materials is also a very critical step.
The reason why helium 3 is used instead of deuterium and tritium gas, the raw material of DT nuclear fusion, is because the conditions required for helium 3 fusion are more stringent.
In fact, to be precise, there are no strict temperature requirements for nuclear fusion to occur, only the intensity of the reaction and whether nuclear fusion can be sustained spontaneously.
For example, the temperature of the core of the sun is only 15 million degrees, but the hydrogen-helium nuclear fusion reaction is always occurring and maintained there.
However, on Earth, if you want to maintain the fusion reaction through controllable nuclear fusion, you need a high temperature of at least 50 million degrees.
As for the higher-level helium-3, if it is used for next-level nuclear fusion, the temperature must be ten times or even higher than that of deuterium-tritium fusion.
Taking the Daybreak Fusion Reactor in front of us as an example, deuterium and tritium gas can produce fusion phenomena at a temperature of about 50 million degrees, while under the same conditions, if helium 3 is to produce fusion phenomena, it needs to reach at least one billion degrees.
As for the simple acceptance, it is definitely not possible to ignite the raw materials to fuse and output electrical energy, and the relevant equipment has not been assembled.
Therefore, in order to prevent experimental deviations caused by spontaneous fusion of raw materials in the reactor chamber at high temperatures of hundreds of millions of degrees, it is most appropriate to use helium-3, which requires a higher fusion temperature, as the experimental raw material.
........
PS: There will be another update tonight, please vote for me!
