Modeling of a Compact Pulser for Isentropic Compression Experiments

Summary form only given. For the past 10 years, equation-of-state experiments have been carried out using magnetic pressure to isentropically compress materials, These experiments were performed at the Z accelerator facility at Sandia National Laboratories. Recently, a compact, fast strip-line pulser was designed with the objective of doing isentropic compression experiments at low cost, with rapid turn around, with good shot-to-shot reproducibility, and with the ability to shape the current profile for the material being tested. In this work, we present 3D simulations of the compact pulser performed with the ALEGRA MHD code. In order to learn more about the pressure magnitude and uniformity, current density distributions were calculated from the capacitors to the load. Free-surface velocity measurements are compared to those obtained from the simulations and show reasonable agreement. Various results describing the electrical characteristics of the system will be discussed.