Ions that hit the doorknob release secondary electrons. A high voltage (about ) between the doorknob and the scintillator accelerates the electrons onto the phosphor screen, where they are converted to photons. These photons are detected by the photomultiplier.
The advantage of the Daly detector is that the photomultiplier can be separated by a window, which lets the photons through from the high vacuum of the mass spectrometer, thus preventing an otherwise possible contamination and extending life span of the detector. The Daly detector also allows a higher acceleration after the field-free region of a time-of-flight mass spectrometer flight tube, which can improve the sensitivity for heavy ions.