HTS Current Leads Prepared by the TFA-MOD Processed YBCO Tapes

Abstract

HTS current leads have been prepared by the TFA-MOD processed YBCO tapes 5 mm in width and around 120 μm in overall thickness. The YBCO superconducting thin layer with 1.5 μm is formed on the oxide buffer layers deposited on Hastelloy substrate tape. The critical current of the YBCO tapes is around 100 A at 77 K in self-field. A current lead unit is composed of a GFRP board and five YBCO tapes soldered to Cu cap at both ends. The transport current of the ten current lead units ranges from 536 A to 408 A at 77 K in liquid nitrogen. The YBCO current lead is assembled from the ten current lead units in parallel. The transport current of 4,000 A at 77 K was stably carried with no voltage generation on the YBCO tapes of the assembled current lead for ten minutes. Furthermore, the trans port current of 5,000 A was successfully applied with voltage of around 200 μV on YBCO tapes. The heat leakage of the assembled YBCO current lead with 150 mm in length between 77 K and 4.2 K is estimated to be 470 mW. Therefore, the heat load of it at transport current of 4000 A corresponds to 0.12 W/kA, which is one order of magnitude smaller than that of conventional Cu current lead. The small heat load results from high current performance and low thermal conductivity in the present YBCO current lead.