Recoil ranges of nuclei produced in the interaction of 80-164 MeV protons with Ni

Cross sections and effective recoil ranges of nuclei produced in the 80, 136, 153, and 164 MeV proton bombardment of ${}_{}{}^{58}{}_{}{}^{}\mathrm{Ni}$ and ${}_{}{}^{62}{}_{}{}^{}\mathrm{Ni}$ targets have been measured using the conventional thick target recoil catcher technique. The measured ranges increase monotonically with the number of nucleons removed from the target, and only for the lightest of the product nuclei are they comparable to values expected for compound nucleus formation. This trend is consistent with the picture in which the initial proton-nucleus interactions leave a few intermediate nuclei over a broad range of excitation, from which the bulk of the final nuclei are produced by evaporation. Detailed comparisons of the observations with predictions of the cascade model are presented and discussed.