Free Electron Laser Commissioning Meeting

Friday, 13 Mar 98
Recorder: C. Bohn

Next Meeting


Date: 20 Mar 98
Time: "0845"-0945
Place: FEL Facility Break Room

Agenda for Next Meeting


Item Person Responsible Time ---- ------------------ -------- Status of Open Action Items All 5 min Commissioning Progress Bohn/All 15 min GEN Irradiation Procedure Boyce/Physics 15 min Microphonics Measurements Merminga 15 min New Issues All 5 min Agenda for next week All 5 min

This Week's Attendees


J. Bennett, S. Benson, G. Biallas, J. Bisognano, C. Bohn, J. Boyce, R. Campisi, J. Delayen, D. Douglas, J. Fugitt, A. Hofler, K. Jordan, R. Legg, L. Merminga, G. Neil, D. Oepts, P. Piot, Q.-S. Shu, R. Walker, B. Yunn

Closed Action Items


Items of Discussion


C. Bohn led a discussion to ascertain where we stand with commissioning preparations. Highlights of the discussion are as follows: - Plans are to turn on electron beam at swing shift Monday, 16 Mar 98. The basic task is to get 2 ľA, 38 MeV beam down to the straight-ahead dump as expeditiously as possible, hopefully by owl shift Thursday, then install the GEN target chamber Thursday and Friday, then irradiate GEN targets through Wednesday of next week. In the process, simple procedures for turning the machine on and off will need to be identified because repeated accesses to the vault will be required for GEN target insertion/removal.

R. Campisi presented results from an extensive set of higher-order-mode measurements in the cryomodule cavities. Many more resonances are present than in the conventional CEBAF setup, and one question was whether cross-coupling between cavities was the cause. The data suggest that cross-coupling is weak, at the 80 dB level. Rather, the lesson seems to be that a small change in geometry can lead to considerable change in Q of strong modes and large change in Q of weak modes. For example, the strong 1890 MHz mode has Q~10^5, about ten times larger than in the original CEBAF test cavities, and the weak 1730 MHz mode has Q~10^7, about 1000 times larger than in the original test cavities. For the cryomodule itself, the beam-breakup-threshold current is about 60 mA assuming a somewhat pessimistic frequency distribution in the eight constituent cavities.

J. Boyce asked that all FEL WBS managers and integrators attempt to log on to the www-based ARR system.

New Issues


No new issues sprung forth at the meeting other than those described above. However, subsequent to the meeting, an uncertainty arose as to the timeline required for GEN target irradiation. We originally planned for 4-hour runs with 2 ľA current. When we began to develop shift plans, our Physics Division contacts recalculated the time per target to be 8 hours. Today, they think it might be as long as 15 hours, presumably due to inserting round targets in a rectangular raster pattern. J. Boyce will continue working with Physics Division people to solidify the plans.

New Action Items


Old Action Items


Procedures in Work


Emittance Growth from CSR

Thread Beam around Machine, Top-Level           Douglas, finalize 6 Mar 98
RF Stability during Energy Recovery             Merminga, 6 Mar 98
MPS/BLM Checkout for First Light                Jordan, 20 Mar 98

(Note:  The highest-priority item here is the procedure for MPS/BLM
Checkout for First Light!)