HARDWARE ARRANGEMENT AND OPERATION

	Most features of personal phaser internal configuration are common 
to Type I and Type II. Energy is stored within a replenishable sarium krellide 
cell. Sarium krellide holds a maximum of 1.3 x 10¤ megajoules per cubic 
centimeter, at a maximum leak rate of no more than 1.05 kilojoules per hour. 
When one considers that the total stored energy of even the Type I phaser, if 
released all at once, is enough to vaporize three cubic meters of tritanium, it 
is reassuring to know that a full storage cell cannot be discharged 
accidentally. Sarium krellide must be coupled with the LiCu 521 crystal for 
discharge to occur. Cell charging can be accomplished aboard ship through 
standard power taps of the electro plasma system, and in the field through 
portable bulk sarium krellide units. The Type I cell measures 2.4 x 3.0 cm and 
holds 7.2 x 10¤ MJ; the Type II cell measures 10.2 x 3.0 cm and holds 4.5 x 10¦ 
MJ.

	Downstream from the power cell are three interconnected control 
modules: the beam control assembly, safety interlock, and subspace 
transceiver assembly (STA). The beam control assembly includes tactile 
interface buttons for configuring the phaser beam width and intensity, and a 
firing trigger. The safety interlock is a code processor for safing the power 
functions of the phaser and for personalizing a phaser for limited personnel 
use. Key-press combinations of beam width and intensity controls are used 
to configure the phaserÕs safety condition. The STA is used as part of the 
safety system while aboard Starfleet vessels. It maintains contact between 
the phaser and the ship computers to assure that power levels are 
automatically restrained during shipboard firings, usually limited to heavy 
stun. Emergency override commands may be keyed in by the beam controls. 
The STA adapted for phaser use is augmented with target sensors and 
processors for distant aiming functions.

	Energy from the power cell is controlled by all three modules and 
routed by shielded conduits to a prefire chamber, a 1.5 cm diameter sphere 
of LiCu 521 reinforced with gulium arkenide. Here the energy is held 
temporarily by a collapsible charge barrier before passing to the actual LiCu 
521 emitter for discharge out of the phaser, creating a pulse. As with the 
larger phaser types, the power level set by the user determines the pulse 
frequency and relative proportion of protonic charge created in the final 
emitter stage. The Type I contains a single prefire chamber; the Type II 
contains four.

	At triggering, the charge barrier field breaks down in 0.02 
picoseconds. Through the rapid nadion effect the LiCu 521 segmented 
emitter converts the pumped energy into a tuned phaser discharge. As with 
the shipÕs main phasers, the greater the energy pumped from the prefire 
chamber, the higher will be the percentage of nuclear disruption force (NDF) 
created. At low to moderate settings, the nuclear disruption threshold will 
not be crossed, limiting the phaser discharge to stun and thermal impact 
resulting from simple electromagnetic (SEM) effects.

	At the higher settings, as an override precaution for the user, the 
discharge will take a distance of approximately one meter to decay and 
recombine to form full-lethality emissions. In the Type I, the emitter crystal is 
an elliptical solid measuring 0.5 x 1.2 cm. In the Type II, it is a regular 
trapezoid 1.5 x 2.85 cm.  Æ