Speaker
Description
Conductor on Round Core (CORC®) cables, consisting of REBCO coated tapes helically wound around a metal former, are a promising conductor option for future high-field dipole magnets in particle accelerators. Crucial to the success of this application is the conductor resilience to mechanical loads. The promising electrical performance of the CORC® wires may be compromised by damage and degradation resulting from forces experienced during magnet fabrication, assembly, cooldown, and energization. This paper compares the mechanical performance of the primary CORC® dipole designs proposed to date: Canted Cosine-theta (CCT), Uni-Layer (UL), and Stress-Managed Cosine-theta (SMCT). These designs all employ a "conductor-in-groove" approach, utilizing rigid metal components to separate the cables and mitigate electromagnetic forces. A 3D electro-magneto-mechanical modeling framework was developed to automatically calculate mechanical stresses in the conductor and mandrel based on the winding configuration. This framework incorporates multi-scale modeling strategies, enabling evaluation of both overall cable loads and localized stresses at the tape level. Using this tool, we explore the performance of each design at different magnetic field levels and investigate the influence of cable constraint conditions provided by different impregnation strategies. These results provide important insights for optimal magnet and cable design choices, highlighting the mechanical challenges and potential failure risks associated with high-field CORC® cable applications, and pointing to possible mitigation strategies to enable such applications.
