The unique Rutherford cabling facility at the Berkeley Center for Magnet Technology, LBNL, has been leading the production of a range of Nb 3 Sn cables for a variety of magnet projects domestically ...and internationally. Cable fabrication is a critical step in accelerator magnet production: to ensure tight dimensional control of the multi-turn coils, fine tolerances must be kept on the cable width, thickness, keystone angle (Cooley et al., 2017) with minimal degradation to the conductor. In addition to these dimensional measurements, we implemented an in-line image acquisition system that can monitor for critical defects such as cross-overs, as well as track the extent of strand deformation at the cable edges. At LBNL, we have collected a large dataset to establish the association between the cable edge facet dimension and the cross-sectional subelement damages. We thus can use image analysis on the facet as an integral and critical quick turn-around-time quality control monitor. Although such measurements are not direct and require a baseline for a given conductor and cable geometry combination, they are non-destructive. They can be measured across the entire length of the cable, which contrasts with critical current or residual resistance ratio measurements, which are only made at the point and tail of the cable and require a lengthy heat-treatment. Moreover, the high frequency of image acquisition coupled with Fast Fourier Transform analysis can give us insights into the key components of the cabling machine as they tend to produce periodic variations within the cable. Such analysis can help find potential faults and inform maintenance planning. This work describes our setup of in-line imaging of Rutherford cables during manufacture, the subsequent image analysis, and data processing. Several case studies illustrate typical usage of the system and lessons learned.
Status of ITER Conductor Development and Production Devred, A.; Backbier, I.; Bessette, D. ...
IEEE transactions on applied superconductivity,
06/2012, Letnik:
22, Številka:
3
Journal Article, Conference Proceeding
Recenzirano
The ITER magnet coils are wound from Cable-In-Conduit Conductors (CICC) made up of superconducting and copper strands assembled into a multistage, rope-type cable inserted into a conduit of ...butt-welded austenitic steel tubes. The conductors for the Toroidal Field (TF) and Central Solenoid (CS) coils require about 500 tons of Nb 3 Sn strands while the Poloidal Field (PF) and Correction Coil (CC) conductors need around 250 tons of Nb-Ti strands. The required amount of Nb 3 Sn strands far exceeds pre-existing industrial capacity and calls for a significant worldwide production scale up. After explaining the in-kind procurement sharing of the various conductor types among the six ITER Domestic Agencies (DA) involved: China, Europe, Japan, South Korea, Russia, and the United States, we detail the technical requirements defined by the ITER International Fusion Energy Organization (IO), and we present a brief status of ongoing productions. The most advanced production is that for the TF conductors, where all six DAs have qualified suppliers and about 50% of the required strands have been produced and registered into the web-based conductor database developed by the IO.
Future high energy physics colliders could benefit from accelerator magnets based on high-temperature superconductors, which may reach magnetic fields of up to 45 T at 4.2 K, twice the field limit of ...the two Nb-based superconductors. Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8-x (Bi-2212) is the only high-Tc cuprate material available as a twisted, multifilamentary and isotropic round wire. However, it has been hitherto unclear how an accelerator magnet can be fabricated from Bi-2212 round wires and whether high field quality can be achieved. This paper reports on the first demonstration of high current Bi-2212 coils using Rutherford cable based on a canted-cosine-theta (CCT) design and an overpressure processing heat treatment. Two Bi-2212 CCT coils, BIN5a and BIN5b, were made from a nine-strand Rutherford cable. Their electromagnetic design is identical, but they were fabricated differently: both coils underwent heat treatment in their aluminum-bronze mandrels, but unlike BIN5a that was impregnated with epoxy in its reaction mandrel, the conductor of BIN5b was transferred to a 3D printed Accura Bluestone mandrel after the heat treatment, a process attempted here for the first time, and was not impregnated. BIN5a reached a peak current of 4.1 kA with a self-field of 1.34 T in the bore. This corresponds to a wire engineering current density (Je) of 912 A mm−2, which is two times that of BIN2-IL, a previous Bi-2212 CCT coil fabricated at LBNL, which used a six-around-one cable processed with the conventional 1 bar pressure melt processing. On the other hand, BIN5b reached 3.1 kA. The coils exhibited no quench training. All the quenches were thermal runaways that occurred at the same location. In addition, we report on the field quality and ramp-dependent hysteresis measurements taken during the test of BIN5a at 4.2 K. Overall, our results demonstrate that the CCT technology is a route that should be further investigated for making high field, potentially quench training free dipole magnets with Bi-2212 cables.
The ITER toroidal field (TF) strand procurement initiated the largest Nb3Sn superconducting strand production hitherto. The industrial-scale production started in Japan in 2008 and finished in summer ...2015. Six ITER partners (so-called Domestic Agencies, or DAs) are in charge of the procurement and involved eight different strand suppliers all over the world, of which four are using the bronze route (BR) process and four the internal-tin (IT) process. In total more than 500 tons have been produced including excess material covering losses during the conductor manufacturing process, in particular the cabling. The procurement is based on a functional specification where the main strand requirements like critical current, hysteresis losses, Cu ratio and residual resistance ratio are specified but not the strand production process or layout. This paper presents the analysis on the data acquired during the quality control (QC) process that was carried out to ensure the same conductor performance requirements are met by the different strand suppliers regardless of strand design. The strand QC is based on 100% billet testing and on applying statistical process control (SPC) limits. Throughout the production, samples adjacent to the strand pieces tested by the suppliers are cross-checked ('verified') by their respective DAs reference labs. The level of verification was lowered from 100% at the beginning of the procurement progressively to approximately 25% during the final phase of production. Based on the complete dataset of the TF strand production, an analysis of the SPC limits of the critical strand parameters is made and the related process capability indices are calculated. In view of the large-scale production and costs, key manufacturing parameters such as billet yield, number of breakages and piece-length distribution are also discussed. The results are compared among all the strand suppliers, focusing on the difference between BR and IT processes. Following the completion of the largest Nb3Sn strand production, our experience gained from monitoring the execution of the QC activities and from auditing the results from the measurements is summarised for future superconducting strand material procurement activities.
High-temperature superconducting <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">\rm{REBa}_{2} Cu_{3} O_{7-x}</tex-math></inline-formula> ( REBCO ) conductors have the potential to generate a high ...magnetic field over a broad temperature range. The corresponding accelerator magnet technology, still in its infancy, can be attractive for future energy-frontier particle colliders such as a multi-TeV muon collider. To help develop the technology, we explore the requirements and potential characteristics of a REBCO magnet, operating at 4.2 or 20 K, with a dipole field of 8 - 10 T in a clear aperture of 150 mm. We use the canted <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">\cos \theta</tex-math></inline-formula> magnet configuration to reduce the electromagnetic stresses on the conductors. We present the resulting dipole fields, field gradients for combined-function cases, conductor stresses, magnet dimensions and conductor lengths. We also discuss the conductor performance that is required to achieve the target dipole field at 4.2 and 20 K. The information can provide useful input to the development of REBCO magnet and conductor technology for collider-ring magnets in a muon collider.
The ITER central solenoid (CS) must be capable of driving inductively 30 000 15 MA plasma pulses with a burn duration of 400 s. This implies that during the lifetime of the machine, the CS, comprised ...of six independently powered coil modules, will have to sustain severe and repeated electromagnetic cycles to high current and field conditions. The design of the CS calls for the use of cable-in-conduit conductors made up of and pure copper strands, assembled in a five-stage, rope-type cable around a central cooling spiral that is inserted into a circle-in-square jacket made up of a special grade of high manganese stainless steel. Since cable-in-conduit conductors are known to exhibit electromagnetic cycling degradation, prior to the launch of production, the conductor design and potential suppliers must be qualified through the successful testing of full-size conductor samples. These tests are carried out at the SULTAN test facility. In this paper, we report the results of the on-going CS conductor performance qualification and we present the options under consideration for the different modules constituting the CS coil.
The performance of the toroidal field (TF) magnet conductors for the ITER machine are qualified by a short full-size sample (4 m) current sharing temperature (Tcs) test in the SULTAN facility at CRPP ...in Villigen, Switzerland, using the operating current of 68 kA and the design peak field of 11.8 T. Several samples, including at least one from each of the six ITER Domestic Agencies participating in TF conductor fabrication (China, European Union, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States), have been qualified by the ITER Organization after achieving Tcs values of 6.0-6.9 K, after 700-1000 electromagnetic cycles. These Tcs values exceed the ITER specification and enabled the industrial production of these long-lead items for the ITER tokamak to begin in each Domestic Agency. Some of these samples did not pass the qualification test. In this paper, we summarize the performance of the qualified samples, analyze the effect of strand performance on conductor performance, and discuss the details of the test results.
In high field magnet applications, Nb 3 Sn coils undergo a heat treatment step after winding. During this stage, coils radially expand and longitudinally contract due to the Nb 3 Sn phase change. In ...order to prevent residual strain from altering superconducting performances, the tooling must provide the adequate space for these dimensional changes. The aim of this paper is to understand the behavior of cable dimensions during heat treatment and to provide estimates of the space to be accommodated in the tooling for coil expansion and contraction. This paper summarizes measurements of dimensional changes on strands, single Rutherford cables, cable stacks, and coils performed between 2013 and 2015. These samples and coils have been performed within a collaboration between CERN and the U.S. LHC Accelerator Research Program to develop Nb 3 Sn quadrupole magnets for the HiLumi LHC. The results are also compared with other high field magnet projects.
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