High-pressure,high-temperature thermophysical measurements on tungsten

Abstract

Wire shaped tungsten samples (0.25 mm diameter, 40 mm length, 99.97%) are resistively pulse heated as part of a coaxially built up capacitor discharge circuit. With heating rates of more than 10⁹ K/s, temperatures up to 12000 K are reached. The tungsten wire is contained with the surrounding medium water in a high pressure vessel with sapphire windows and a maximum pressure capability of 0.5 GPa. Time correlated measurements of the current through the wire and the voltage drop across it as well as surface radiation and wire expansion can be performed simultaneously and allow the determination of thermophysical properties for the liquid tungsten (see key words). All measuring systems have rise times less than 10 ns.