CERN, Geneva
After the incident on the 19th September 2008 and more than one year without beam the commissioning of the LHC started again on November 20, 2009. Progress was rapid and collisions under stable beam conditions were established at 1.2 TeV within 3 weeks. In 2010 after qualification of the new quench protection system the way to 3.5 TeV was open and collisions were delivered at this energy after a month of additional commissioning. This paper describes the experiences and issues encountered during these first periods of commissioning with beam.
CERN, Geneva
The transfer lines from the SPS to the LHC, TI2 and TI8, with a total length of almost 6km are the longest ones in the world. For that reason even small systematic optics errors are not negligible because they add up and result in an injection mismatch in the LHC. Next to other lattice measurement methods Kick-response measurements were the most important sources of information during the early phases of beam commissioning of these transfer lines and the LHC ring. This measurement technique was used to verify orbit-corrector and BPM gains as well as to sort out optics errors. Furthermore fits to off-momentum kick response turned out to be an appropriate method to establish a model for systematic errors of the transfer line magnets. This paper shortly describes the tools and methods developed for the analysis of the taken data and presents the most important results of the analysis.
CERN, Geneva
Following the LHC injection tests of 2008, two injection tests took place in October and November 2009 as preparation for the LHC restart on November 20, 2009. During these injection tests beam was injected through the TI2 transfer line into sector 23 of ring 1 and through TI8 into the sectors 78, 67 and 56 of ring 2. The beam time was dedicated to injection steering, optics measurements and debugging of all the systems involved. Because many potential problems were sorted out in advance, these tests contributed to the rapid progress after the restart. This paper describes the experiences and issues encountered during these tests as well as related measurement results.
CERN, Geneva
SLAC, Menlo Park, California
Fermilab, Batavia
Unbunched beam is a potentially serious issue in the LHC as it may quench the superconducting magnets during a beam abort. Unbunched particles, either not captured by the RF system at injection or leaking out of the RF bucket, will be removed by using the existing damper kickers to excite resonantly the particles in the abort gap. Following beam simulations, a strategy for cleaning the abort gap at different energies was proposed. The plans for the commissioning of the beam abort gap cleaning are described, and the first results from the beam commissioning are presented.
CERN, Geneva
Nominal beam parameters at 7TeV/c will only be reached after some years of operation, with each proton beam having a stored energy of 360MJ. However, a small fraction of this energy is sufficient to damage accelerator equipment or experiments in case of uncontrolled beam loss. The correct functioning of the machine protection systems is vital during the different operational phases already for initial operation. When operating the complex magnet system, with and without beam, safe operation relies on the protection and interlock systems for the superconducting circuits. For safe injection and transfer of beam from SPS to LHC, transfer line parameters are monitored, beam absorbers must be in the correct position and the LHC must be ready to accept beam. At the end of a fill and in case of failures beams must be properly extracted onto the dump blocks, for some failures within less than few hundred microseconds. Safe operation requires many systems: beam dumping system, beam interlocks, beam instrumentation, equipment monitoring, collimators and absorbers, etc. We describe the commissioning of the LHC machine protection system and the experience during the initial operation.
CERN, Geneva
The LHC beam dump system was commissioned with beam in 2009. This paper describes the operational experience with the kicker systems and the tests and measurements to qualify them for operation. The kicker performance was characterized with beam by measurements of the kicker waveforms using bunches extracted at different times along the kicker sweep. The kicker performance was also continuously monitored for each pulse with measurement and analysis of each kick pulse, allowing diagnostic of errors and of long-term drifts. The results are described and compared to the expectations.
EBG MedAustron, Wr. Neustadt
CERN, Geneva
The LHC beam dump system has to safely dispose all beams in a wide energy range of 450 GeV to 7 TeV. A 3 μs abort gap in the beam structure for the switch-on of the extraction kicker field ideally allows a loss free extraction under normal operating conditions. However, a low number of asynchronous beam aborts is to be expected from reliability calculations and from the first year's operational experience with the beam dump kickers. For such cases, MAD-X simulations including all optics and alignment errors have been performed to determine loss patterns around the LHC as a function of the position of the main protection elements in interaction region six. Special attention was paid to the beam load on the tungsten collimators which protect the triplets in the LHC experimental insertions, and the tracking results compared with semi-analytical numerical estimates. The simulations are also compared to the results of beam commissioning of these protection devices.
CERN, Geneva
The beam profile screens in the long SPS to LHC transfer lines were used to measure with high precision the emittance growth arising from scattering. The effective thickness of the scatterer could be varied by adding thick Al2O3 fluorescent screens, with the emittance measurement made using very thin Ti OTR screens. The technique allows the intrinsic variation in the emittance from the injector chain to be factored out of the measurement, and was applied to Pb82+ and protons, both with 450 GeV rigidity. The results are presented and the possible applications to the accurate benchmarking of nuclear interaction codes discussed.
CERN, Geneva
The tilt mismatch between the LHC and its transfer lines arises from the use of combined horizontal and vertical bends. The mismatch gives rise to several subtle optical effects, including a coupling at injection into the LHC which depends on the phase of the oscillation amplitude at the injection point. This coupling was observed for the first time in 2008, and in 2009 dedicated measurements were made. The results are described and compared with the expectations, and the operational implications detailed.
CERN, Geneva
DESY, Hamburg
The quality of the injection into the LHC is monitored by a dedicated software system which acquires and analyses the pulse waveforms from the injection kickers, and measures key beam parameters and compares them with the nominal ones. The beam losses at injection are monitored on many critical devices in the injection regions, together with the longitudinal filling pattern and maximum trajectory offset on the first 100 turns. The paper describes the injection quality check system and the results from LHC beam commissioning, in particular the beam losses measured during injection at the various aperture limits. The results are extrapolated to full intensity and the consequences are discussed.
CERN, Geneva
The movable LHC injection protection devices in the SPS to LHC transfer lines and downstream of the injection kicker in the LHC were commissioned with low-intensity beam. The different beam-based alignment measurements used to determine the beam centre and size are described, together with the results of measurements of the transverse beam distribution at large amplitude. The system was set up with beam to its nominal settings and the protection level against various failures was determined by measuring the transmission and transverse distribution into the LHC as a function of oscillation amplitude. Beam losses levels for regular operation were also extrapolated. The results are compared with the expected device settings and protection level, and the implications for LHC operation discussed.
CERN, Geneva
The commissioning of the beam transfer systems for LHC included detailed aperture measurements in the injection regions and for the beam dump systems. The measurements, mainly single pass, were made using systematic scans of different oscillation phases and amplitudes, and the results compared with the expectations from the physical aperture model of the LHC. In this paper the measurements and results are presented and compared with the specified apertures in these critical areas.
CERN, Geneva
TRIUMF, Vancouver
In 2008, the SPS-to-LHC transfer line operation allowed for the first time to perform beam measurements in the last part of the lines and into the LHC. Beam parameters were measured and compared with expectation. Discrepancies were observed in the dispersion matching into the LHC, and also in the vertical phase advance along the line. In 2009, extensive theoretical and simulation work was performed in order to understand the possible sources of these discrepancies. This allowed establishing an updated model of the beam line, taking into account the importance of the full magnetic model, the limited dipole corrector strengths and the precise alignment of beam elements. During 2009, beam time was allocated in order to perform further measurements, checking and refining the optical model of the transfer line and LHC injection region and validating the different assumptions. Results of the 2009 optics measurements and comparison with the beam specification and model are presented.
CERN, Geneva
PSI, Villigen
The performance of the CERN PS Booster (PSB) synchrotron is believed to be limited mainly by direct space charge effects at low energy. The main motivation to construct Linac4 is to raise the PSB injection energy to mitigate direct space charge effects. At present, simulation of the injection and the ow energy part of the cycle aim at defining Investigations on the influence of parameters of the injected beam on the performance of the PSB are described.
CERN, Geneva
Proton and ion beams will be injected into LHC at 450 GeV by two kicker magnet systems, producing magnetic field pulses of up to 7.8 μs flat top duration with rise and fall times of not more than 900 ns and 3 μs, respectively. Both systems are composed of four traveling wave kicker magnets, powered by pulse forming networks. One of the stringent design requirements of these systems is a field flat top and post pulse ripple of less than ±0.5 %. A carefully matched high bandwidth system is required to obtain the stringent pulse response. Screen conductors are placed in the aperture of the kicker magnet to provide a path for the image current of the, high intensity, LHC beam and screen the ferrite against Wake fields: these conductors affect the field pulse response. Recent injection tests provided the opportunity to directly measure the shape of the kick field pulse with high accuracy using a pilot beam. This paper details the measurements and compares the results with predictions and laboratory measurements.
CERN, Geneva
Within the scope of the LHC injector upgrade, it is proposed to replace the present injector chain by new accelerators, Linac4, SPL and PS2, for which new beam transfer lines are required. The beam properties and requirements for each of the lines are summarized. The original design of the beam lines has been fully reconsidered due to the very demanding constraints on the beam line layouts at the PS2 injection / extraction regions and a new straight section of the PS2 which led to a much improved beam line geometry. The relevant modifications and optics designs are described and a preliminary specification of the beam line equipment is also given.
CERN, Geneva
A new design of the injection-extraction straight section for PS2 has been made, motivated by problematic intersections of the PS2 transfer lines, potential gain in drift length for the beam transfer systems and reduction of the total straight section length. The new straight contains two injection systems with separate beam lines and three extraction systems to the SPS sharing a single beam line, together with an extracted "waste" beam from the H- injection with its line to a beam dump. A symmetric doublet structure was chosen, with a reduced number of cells and quadrupoles. The optics solutions are described and the matching and tuning flexibility investigated. The implications for the different injection and extraction systems and transfer lines will be discussed, together with the specific issues of integration into the overall lattice.
CERN, Geneva
The High Radiation to Materials facility - thereafter HiRadMat - is designed to allow testing of accelerator components, in particular those of the LHC and its injectors, with the impact of high-intensity pulsed beams. The facility is currently under construction, as an approved CERN project. The installation of the dedicated primary beam line and experimental area is planned during the 2010-2011 CERN accelerator technical shutdown. It will be ready for users after commissioning and some initial running in October 2011. A detailed proton beam line design has been performed in order to fulfill the beam parameter specification, in particular the demanding optics flexibility at the test stand location. The studies presented include trajectory correction and aperture studies as well as specifications of magnetic systems, power converters, beam instrumentation and vacuum systems.
CERN, Geneva
Beam physics considerations for the stripping foil of the 160 MeV PSB H- injection system are described, including the arguments for the foil type, thickness, geometry and positioning. The foil performance considerations are described, including expected stripping efficiency, emittance growth, energy straggling, temperature and lifetime. The different beam loss mechanisms are quantified in the context of the aperture limits, operational considerations and collimation requirements.
CERN, Geneva
Linac4 is the new H- linear accelerator under construction at CERN aiming to double the brightness of the beam injected to the CERN PS Booster (PSB) for delivering proton beams to experiments or further CERN accelerators, down to the LHC. The injection system in the PSB is based on the H- charge exchange where the 160 MeV H- beam is converted into an H+ beam by stripping the electrons with a carbon foil. A beam dump located inside a pulsed magnet for the injection bump will intercept the unstripped ions (H0 and H-) and measure the collected charge to detect the relative efficiency and degradation of the stripping foil. The challenge of the dump design is to meet the requirements of a beam dump providing a current measurement and at the same time minimizing the perturbation of the magnetic field of the surrounding pulsed magnet. This paper describes all phases of the dump design and the main issues related to its integration in the line.
CERN, Geneva
FZJ, Jülich
The PS2 ring is designed with negative momentum compaction arc cells and doublet straights. In this paper, different lattice geometries are considered. In particular, a two-fold symmetric lattice with dispersion suppressors and a 3-fold symmetric one with resonant arc cells are compared with respect to their optics properties, and ability to satisfy space and magnet constraints. The tuning flexibility of rings based on these two options is presented. Finally, the impact of different geometries on resonance excitation and dynamic aperture is evaluated.
CERN, Geneva
The PS2 lattice, based on Negative Momentum Compaction (NMC) arc cells is being optimized in order to accommodate a new all-doublet long-straight section (LSS) design. Apart from smoothing the optics and enabling different tuning solutions for H- injection, the optimization focuses on increasing the available magnet-to-magnet drift space and reducing the quadrupole types and strengths. The variation of lattice parameters for a wide range of working points is presented.