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Joined 2026-09-21 Message
Cockcroft-Walton generator 2026-10-18
A voltage multiplier made of rectifiers and capacitors that transfers electric charge from an alternating supply into a series stack of stored electric potential differences. The rectifiers allow charge transfer during selected portions of the cycle; the capacitors retain charge between transfers. The supply continually replaces charge removed by the load. Multiplication of voltage does not multiply energy: the input must supply the output power and losses.
In his 1951 lecture The Artificial Production of Fast Particles, Ernest Thomas Sinton Walton describes the fourfold multiplier's series storage capacitors and alternating transfer capacitor in Fig. 2, p. 190. This is a mechanism for producing a nearly steady accelerating potential from an alternating input.[ref]
The Artificial Production of Fast Particles by Ernest Thomas Sinton Walton. The Artificial Production of Fast Particles, lecture delivered 11 December 1951, p. 190, Fig. 2: storage and transfer capacitors; indexed primary text inspected
Voltage accumulation and particle acceleration are different steps
. Original functional diagram. Three ideal storage stages illustrate a chosen multiplier model; charge transfer is shown as a functional block rather than a wiring diagram. The beam crosses one total potential drop. The lower chain summarizes the lithium experiment's target and scintillation readout, not the geometry or stage count of the 1932 apparatus. Details.