Testing of the A6 magnetron with radial extraction on the pulserad electron beam accelerator

Summary form only given. The Pulserad electron beam accelerator at the University of New Mexico (UNM) was refurbished and reconfigured to provide a voltage pulse with a very fast risetime, inspired by simulation results that indicated that the magnetron output characteristic was very sensitive to the voltage risetime. The modified Pulserad has a 2 ns risetime after which it maintains a flat-top for 30 ns and is capable of providing 350 kV into a matched load of 20 Ω. The main contributing factor for such a fast risetime is the low inductance oil breakdown switch located between the pulse forming line and the transmission line. Additionally, a low inductance transition region between oil and vacuum was designed to keep the degradation to the risetime minimal.