Magnetic field measurements of quadrupoles in the High-Current Experiment

The High-Current Experiment (HCX) at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory is part of the US program to explore heavy-ion beam transport at a scale representative of the low-energy end of an induction linac driver for fusion energy production. Four pulsed magnetic quadrupoles are being used to study gas and electron effects with a 0.2 A, 1-MeV K+ beam. The magnets, originally designed and built for a prototype pulsed magnetic quadrupole array, have an elliptical beam tube (6×10 cm) and iron yoke. The magnet coil and field length are ≈31 cm, and operating gradients are 10–40 T/m. To establish that the field quality of the prototype quadrupoles is satisfactory for the experiments, a 1-cm pickup loop was used to measure the flux Br(θ) at the magnet mid-plane and also at the lead and return ends. A longer probe was used to measure the integrated flux of Bθ(θ) along the magnet. The field quality appears satisfactory for the short transport experiments through these quadrupoles.