CERN VACUUM SYSTEM ACTIVITIES DURING THE LONG SHUTDOWN 1: THE LHC BEAM VACUUM

Abstract

After the Long Shutdown 1 (LS1) and the consolidation of the magnet bus bars, the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC) will operate with nominal beam parameters. Larger beam energy, beam intensities and luminosity are expected. Despite the very good performance of the beam vacuum system during the 2010-12 physics run (Run 1), some particular areas require attention for repair, consolidation and upgrade. Among the main activities, a large campaign aiming at the repair of the RF bridges of some vacuum modules is conducted. Moreover, consolidation of the cryogenic beam vacuum systems with burst disk for safety reasons is implemented. In addition, NEG cartridges, NEG coated inserts and new instruments for the vacuum system upgrade are installed. Besides these activities, repair, consolidation and upgrades of other beam equipment such as collimators, kickers and beam instrumentations are carried out. In this paper, the motivation and the description for such activities, together with the expected beam vacuum performance after LS1, are described in detail.