A Long Charging Delay for a No-Insulation REBCO Layer-Wound Coil and its Influence on Operation with Outer LTS coils

Abstract

This paper presents a long charging delay for a no-insulation (NI) REBCO layer-wound (LW) coil and an electromagnetic-induced thermal runaway, resulting in damages on the coil. A small NI REBCO LW coil with a self-inductance of 1.62 mH showed a charging delay time constant of ∼3000 s at 4.2 K. The coil was installed in the cold bore of a low-temperature superconducting (LTS) magnet, and the LTS outer coil was charged. Although the circuit of the NI REBCO LW coil was opened, the induced current inside the coil screened the magnetic field generated by the outer coils. Eventually, the NI REBCO LW coil showed a thermal runaway during charging the outer coils. After the experiment, we found burnouts of the REBCO conductor near the electrodes and buckling of the conductor for all the layers of the winding. The present results point out the technical problem and the worst case for a NI REBCO LW coil, which must be considered.