We report here the long term performance of a small, multi‐tube AMTEC converter. This converter was designed to operate and produce approximately of electrical output from a small, 4 to 6 watt radioisotope heat source for remote power applications. It was built and put on test in 1999 using electrical heaters as stand‐ins for the radioisotope capsule. Since that time it has accumulated more than 5 years of run time at an input heater temperature of 700 °C, with numerous thermal cycles to ambient that were generally related to grid power failures or physical moves of the test apparatus. The power output has remained, with variations due to orientation changes and minor variations due to small temperature changes, essentially constant at 0.40 W to 0.60 W over the test period and operation is ongoing. The converter casing and mechanical structure was fabricated from 316 SS and the electrodes are sputtered titanium nitride films. Separate static tests of a multilayer insulation package suitable for use with the converter showed the capability to reach 700 °C with a thermal input of < 4 watts.
Fractional Watt AMTEC Converter
SPACE TECH.& APPLIC.INT.FORUM-STAIF 2006: 10th Conf Thermophys Applic Microgravity; 23rd Symp Space Nucl Pwr & Propulsion; 4th Conf Human/Robotic Tech & Nat'l Vision for Space Explor.; 4th Symp Space Coloniz.; 3rd Symp on New Frontiers & Future Concepts ; 2006 ; Albuquerque, New Mexico (USA)
AIP Conference Proceedings ; 813 , 1 ; 567-572
2006-01-20
6 pages
Conference paper
Electronic Resource
English
Fractional Watt AMTEC Converter
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