EARLY PHENOMENA OF CAPILLARY DISCHARGES FOR AN ELECTROTHERMAL GUN

The 80 kJ electrothermal gun facility at Kumamoto University was assem bled in order to investigate the phenomena of capillary discharges and to determine parameters of plasmas produced by a high power pulse dis charge in the capillary. The behavior of capillary discharges is obser ved by using an image converter camera in order to make clear the earl y phenomena of the capillary discharge in different ambient pressures. The behavior of early capillary discharges varies from are discharge to surface discharges with decreasing ambient pressure. (C) 1996 Ameri can Institute of Physics.