Explosively driven opening switch for the 20-megampere Procyon experiments

The Los Alamos foil implosion program has growing needs for large pulsed power systems. We are developing the Procyon explosive pulsed power system to drive [approximately] 15-MA, 3-[mu]s experiments, and we have previously published considerations involved in the system design. Results of four tests conducted in the initial Procyon development series have also been published. From these tests we concluded that it is possible to supply the curent for 1-MJ kinetic energy plasma z-pinch implosions. Capacitor bank failures on two subsequent tests have slowed our progress, but from these tests we have developed confidence in the precision of our explosively formed fuse (EFF) triggering processes. In this paper, we will summarize the results to date, and describe the performance of our EFF and its triggering system.