Preliminary results of foam liner compression on the plasma focus PF-3-facility

One of the directions under development now at RRC Kurchatov Institute is the study an opportunity to use Plasma Focus - type facilities as as drivers for the magnetic compression of liners. The main goal of the study is to produce experimental data on the compression of foam loads at PF-3-facility. A loading device, allowing one to install the liner at the preset position in the discharge volume without violation of the vacuum conditions, has been developed for improving the current sheath parameters. The experiments with thin-walled agar foam liners with linear mass (0.3divided by4.0) mg/cm at discharge current 2divided by3 MA are performed. Main outcome of these experiments is demonstrating of effect of easy (0.3divided by0.6) mg/cm liners compression with velocity approximate to3 x 10(6) cm/s.