Study on the winding quality for spiral HTS cables based on AI detection model

Abstract

The development of high-temperature superconducting (HTS) conductors is leading to diverse structural designs of HTS cables. (RE)Ba2Cu3O x (REBCO) tapes using spiral geometry has been a popular compact HTS cable structure, which is in the critical stage of engineering production and application. However, the winding quality of REBCO tapes is unstable for spiral HTS cables, because of the different winding methods like manual winding, device-assisted winding, or automatic winding. Although automatic winding will be the first choice for the actual applications by spiral HTS cables, the related winding quality is not monitored effectively yet. In this paper, we first discuss the possible influence of the winding quality on the critical current performance of spiral HTS cables. Then, an artificial intelligence (AI) based method is implemented to realize the detection model for the winding quality. From image data preparation to AI detection and postprocessing, the detection model provides the final results to show the winding intervals as a binary image. Through the intuitive analysis and the evaluation metrics, both error and correct winding conditions obtain acceptable detection results, and the correct one has a better performance. The identification of the winding intervals will help to determine the monitoring strategy for the spiral HTS cable fabrication.