Designing and Testing a Quench Heater for a 16 T CIC Dipole

Abstract

The purpose of this project is to create and design a quench heater for the 16 T Cable-in-Conduit (CIC) superconducting magnet. This magnet will be used to create stronger and more cost-effective particle accelerators. The quench heater is a device that is designed to protect the magnet from an unexpected quench. In order to achieve this, the quench heater must be able to produce enough heat to heat the superconducting wires in the CIC cable to approximately 9K over the course of 10 ms. To design a quench heater in this way, it is required to find the dimensions needed using simulations. After finding the required dimensions, a Computer Assisted Design (CAD) file was created so the design could be machined to the exact specifications. Then, using liquid helium and one cable, we tested if the heater would properly heat the cable. Thermocouple wires were integrated into the cable to measure the temperature of the wires during the experiment. This physical experiment has not yet been conducted and thus the results are still unknown. It is expected that the quench heater will be able to properly heat the cable over the 10 ms timeframe. If this experiment is successful, this design for a quench heater will be used for the 16 T CIC cable.