Search for impurities of counting gases in ionization chambers

In order to reach for the gas detectors applied at the ALADIN spectrometer of the GSI an as good as possible and timely remaining gas purity, a study on the kind and effects of impurities in different counting gases was performed. The gas purity was observed via the signal height of an α source after a drift path of the electrons of 50 cm. A steady decrease of the α-signals was measures, the steepness of which decreases slowly as function of the time. The half-life lies in the range of weeks, which lets conclude on a slow outgassing from the materials of the arrangement. By a gas chromatography and mass spectroscopy these impurities could be determined. Beside impurities by polar molecules as water and oxygen from the atmosphere, which are deposed in microscopical capillaries of the chamber materials and then outgassed in the samples after several days so-called softeners could be observed. Because these impurities in the arrangement at the ALADIN spectrometer cannot be avoided, a purification system in the flow-through operation was constructed and its effect tested. The gas quality can by this over several days be kept in the mean constant. In this dynamical process the fluctuations of the signal heights lie at ±0.7%. A ionization chamber as monitor for the gas purity was constructed and tested with different gas mixtures concerning observables like signal height and drift time. By this calibrated monitor in the experiment at the ALADIN spectrometer the gas quality can be independently determined. (orig.)