The fabrication and initial testing of the SNS RFQ

The Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) is designing and building the 2.5 MeV front end injector for the Spallation Neutron Source (SNS). This injector comprises an H^- ion source, a low energy beam transport line (LEBT), a radio-frequency quadrupole (RFQ) and a beam transport line designed to provide fast chopping of the beam. The RFQ is designed to accelerate the Hbeam from the energy of 65 keV to 2.5 MeV, while bunching it at 402.5 MHz. This high duty factor (6%) structure is made of a combination of Glidcop and OFE copper and is fully brazed. The RFQ is built in 4 modules, each approximately one meter long. This paper covers the mechanical fabrication details of the modules, three of which have been completed. While the modules are coming out of production, they are conditioned and tested to full power. This paper will also describe the results of the beam tests on the first module, including capture efficiency and transmission