Operation of amplitrons in parallel

The purpose of this experiment is to demonstrate the feasability of separately driving two Amplitrons from a common source and to combine their individual rf output power into one common terminal. Although operating Amplitrons in this manner has long been considered feasible, this is the first experimental setup to demonstrate such operation. A QK630 L-Band Stabilotron was used as the driver source. Its power was split in a tee-section, each arm of which was connected through an isolator and directional couplers to the input of the QK520 L-Band Amplitrons. The output of the Amplitrons are connected together through a tee-section to a common output load. The directional couplers are of the type that permits the simultaneous monitoring of incident and reflected powers. A coaxial phase shifter is provided for in one of the input arms to assure that the rf output power of each Amplitron arrives at the output tee-section equi-phased in order to add up properly and not end up returning as reflected power through the other Amplitron. Monitoring of the reflected power in the directional coupler was found to be a very sensitive way to adjust the phase shifter.