[time-nuts] H-Maser, but not on ebait...

[Neon John]

On Sun, 10 Jun 2007 11:18:44 -0600, Scott Lacy <time2 at arcind.net> wrote:

>> I see it comes with manuals; does it also include the physicist?
>> (I've heard that, in the early days at least, that each maser
>> required one full-time physicist to keep it running ;-)

Hi Scott,

Just dropping a note to thank you for putting those manuals up.  I've learned a LOT
by studying particularly the service manual.

This may be a dumb question but I'm going to ask anyway.  With so many factors
affecting the hydrogen's masing (is that the correct term) frequency - temperature,
pressure, magnetic field, etc), how can a maser be a primary standard?  I understand
that it can be an incredibly stable transfer standard but how can it be considered a
constant?

One more question.  I noted in the service manual where it states that the quartz
resonator is coated with teflon to prevent "hydrogen interaction" or some such term.
Does that mean that the monatomic hydrogen in the resonator would react with the
quartz and be consumed or is there more a concern for sputtering of the quartz
surface?

John
---
John De Armond
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