Mechanical behavior of a 16 T FCC dipole magnet during a quench

Abstract

Future accelerator magnets are pushed to their limits in terms of magnetic field, mechanical strength and from the quench protection point of view. This forces the magnet designers to re-think the quench modelling. One issue that has not so far been largely explored is the mechanical behaviour of the superconducting coils during a quench. This can cause limitations to the design of high field accelerator magnets. This paper focuses on mechanical behavior in the event of a quench of a Nb3Sn 16 T dipole magnet currently developed in the framework of the EuroCirCol project in view of the Future Circular Collider conceptual design study. The thermo-mechanical analysis is performed through finite element modeling. The analysis takes into account the Lorentz force and the thermal stress due to the non-uniform temperature distribution in the winding during a quench.