An experiment has been set-up which allows to confine calcium ions for a few hours. In a first step, the ions have been detected with two electronic techniques: Resonant ejection using an electron multiplier and the detection of the ionic power absorption in a tuned circuit. The influence of collisions with a buffer gas on trapping times and the evolution of space charge has been shown using the second method. The ion cloud has been detected by the fluorescence of the CaII resonance lines, either by employing a buffer gas, or by using a double-resonance scheme. The natural lifetimes of both metastable states have been measured making use of the direct excitation of the electric quadrupolar transitions 4S-3D. This original method provides very precise results. De-excitation rates of the metastable states towards the ground-state (quenching) have been determined by measuring the variation of the effective lifetime using different buffer gases. A steady-state study (sensitized fluorescence) and a time-resolved study of the populations of the long-lived D-states have allowed to determine reaction rates for the mixing of the fine-structure levels.
