The effect of voltage droop on the output of an electrostatic accelerator free electron laser

Electrostatic accelerator FEL oscillators when operated with energy recovery offer the prospect of long pulse, single-mode operation with very narrow linewidth at high-power levels. However, special care with wiggler construction, electron beam steering, and collector design is necessary to reduce the fraction of the electron beam lost before depressed collection to a sufficiently small value to stop the output hopping from one longitudinal mode of the cavity to another due to the droop of the terminal accelerating voltage. We are investigating what minimum recovery fraction is required both experimentally and theoretically. We have constructed a pulsed microwave FEM oscillator having an accelerating voltage of 65 kV supplied by a source, which is a capacitor, charged by a low-current, high-voltage supply. By changing the capacitor value, it is easily possible to achieve a range of voltage droop rates. Furthermore, because the gain bandwidth of the FEM is small, only 1 or 2 longitudinal modes are capable of being amplified at any voltage which eases the problem of analysing mode hopping behaviour. A simple model of mode switching is outlined.