• M.C.L. Buzio, P. Galbraith, S.S. Gilardoni, D. Giloteaux, G. Golluccio, C. Petrone, L. Walckiers
  CERN, Geneva
• A. Beaumont
  EBG MedAustron, Wr. Neustadt

At CERN, the control of five of the accelerators in the injector chain (i.e. PS, PS Booster, SPS, LEIR and AD) is based upon real-time magnetic measurements in a reference magnet. These systems ("B-trains") include usually a field marker to signal the achievement of a given field value, complemented by one or more pick-up coils to integrate flux changes. Recently, some issues have been raised concerning long-term reliability and possible performance improvements, in terms of both resolution and operational flexibility, for these systems. This paper reports the results of R&D activities launched to address these concerns, namely: the development of a novel ferrite gradient compensator to enable dynamic NMR field marking in the PS' combined function magnets; and the preliminary design of a standardized electronic acquisition and conditioning system aimed at enabling the requested improvements and at facilitating rapid maintenance interventions.

• M.C.L. Buzio, L. Bottura, O. Dunkel, L. Fiscarelli, J. Garcia Perez, G. Montenero, E. Todesco, L. Walckiers
  CERN, Geneva
• P. Arpaia
  U. Sannio, Benevento

One of the main requirements for the operation of the Large Hadron Collider at CERN is the correction of the dynamic multipole errors produced in the main magnets*. In particular, integrated sextupole errors in the main dipoles must be kept well below 0.1 units to ensure acceptable chromaticity. The feed-forward control of the LHC is based on the Field Description for the LHC (FiDel), a semi-empirical mathematical model capable of forecasting the magnet's behaviour in order to generate suitable corrector current waveforms. Measurement campaigns were recently undertaken to validate the model making use of a novel fast rotating-coil magnetic measurement system (FAME)**, able to detect superconductor decay and snapback transients with unprecedented accuracy and temporal resolution. In this paper we discuss the test setup and the results obtained both on the test bench and in the actual operation of the accelerator.

* P. Xydi et al, "A Demonstration Experiment For The Forecast Of Magnetic Field … ", EPAC 2008
** N. R. Brooks et al, "Estimation Of Mechanical Vibration Of …", IEEE TAS 2008