High-power Pulsed HCl Chemical Laser

A study is reported on the improvement of an output performance of a pulsed HCl chemical laser. Utilizing a low-impedance Blumlein discharge for a mixture of H2 and Cl2, together with an effective prei oni zat i on by corona discharge and/or X-ray, an HCl laser gave a maximum laser energy of 133mJ, which corresponds to a specific laser energy of 0.67 J/1. A numerical analysis predicting the contribution of vibrationally excited H2 to the enhancement of the HCl laser energy is also presented.