Comprehensive quench analyses of the NHMFL 32T all superconducting magnet. Our approach to a quench simulation, detection and protection of REBCO-coated-conductor-wound coils.
A.V. Gavrilin, H.W. Weijers, D.K. Hilton, W.D. Markiewicz, P.D. Noyes, D.V. Abraimov, Z. Johnson, A. Khan, J. Lu, H. Bai, and M.D. Bird National High Magnetic Field Laboratory, Tallahassee, Florida, USA
The National High Magnetic Field Laboratory (NHMFL) has embarked on an effort to build a unique all-superconducting DC magnet system to generate 32T. The system is envisioned to consist of a REBCO-coated-conductor/tape-wound two-nested-coil inner magnet (insert) and a multi-coil LTS outer magnet (outsert). The outsert is already built and tested by Oxford Instruments, and delivered to and installed at the NHMFL. The insert is under construction at the NHMFL.
A complex approach to a quench modeling was developed and a sophisticated computer code for full-scale quench simulations of a magnet system consisting of a multi-coil REBCO insert and a multi-coil LTS outsert, with due regard for the electrical circuit complexity, was created at the NHMFL. Analytical models of the processes governing a REBCO magnet quench behavior have been developed and appropriately included in the code. A special attention was paid to modeling of the insert active and passive quench protection and quench detection systems’ operation and actual conductor/tape layout in the REBCO coils, along with many other aspects. The active protection system includes the tailor-made quench heaters to normalize promptly the winding in the event of quench. The layout was optimized to have high uniformity of the field and a desired margin from the quench protection standpoint. Also, it is worthy of note that the transport critical current dependence on the magnetic flux density orientation (“field angle”) was appropriately included. The dependence was measured at a number of fixed temperatures that enabled one to suggest a series of practical and convenient fit functions for the IC (versus the field magnitude, field angle and temperature data) [1] to be used in the quench simulations. The problems of AC losses, screening currents and LHe penetration in the insert winding are viewed as well, though some uncertainties and difficulties still exist here to be addressed and understood better further. Numerous quench test measurements on the insert prototypes helped us develop, verify, and adjust our approach to the quench modeling and enhance our understanding of the quench development phenomenon in REBCO coils in various case scenarios.
[1] D.K. Hilton, A.V. Gavrilin and U.P. Trociewitz, “Practical fit functions for transport critical current versus field magnitude and angle data from (RE)BCO coated conductors at fixed low temperatures and in high magnetic fields”, Superconductor Science and Technology, Volume 28 , Number 7, 2015; available on-line: http://iopscience.iop.org/0953-2048/28/7/074002/article.