The invention, intended primarily for use in a steel
flywheel power source (30), provides a vacuum
system and a method of maintaining a vacuum inside a
flywheel chamber (32) for the life of the power source (30). The vacuum
system combines the use of cleaning and de-gassing treatments in the chamber (32) and vacuum
tempering of the steel
flywheel (31) with the use of a chemical
type metal alloy nonevaporable
getter, such as
zirconium-
vanadium-iron, that cooperatively matches the
outgassing of the flywheel (31) and chamber (32) by sorbing those gases that are released. The
getter may be reactivated throughout the life of the flywheel
system by reheating it with an integral heater that is triggered by a
timer instead of a vacuum gauge to increase the system reliability, using power taken directly from the energy stored in the flywheel. The
electronics (45) of the flywheel power source are used to
signal an alarm or prevent achieving or maintaining full speed of the flywheel when the vacuum in the chamber degrades.