Additive Manufacturing of an IH-Type Linac Structure from Stainless Steel and Pure Copper

Abstract

Additive manufacturing (AM) of metals has the potential to provide significant benefits for the construction of future particle accelerators. The combination of low cost manufacturing of complex geometries in combination with efficiency gains from improved linac design enabled by AM may be one way towards future cost-effective green accelerator facilities. As a proof of concept, we present a high-efficiency Zeff=280 MΩ/m, 433.632 MHz IH-DTL cavity based on an AM design. In this case, the complex internal drift tube structures with internal cooling channels have been produced from 1.4404 stainless steel and from pure copper using AM. The prototype cavity, as well as stainless steel AM parts have been electroplated with copper. We present results from successful vacuum tests, low level RF measurements of the cavity, as well as the status of preparations for high-power RF tests with a 30 kW pulsed power amplifier.

Improving Fabrication and Performance of Additively Manufactured RF Cavities by Employing Co-Printed Support Structures and Their Subsequent Removal

“…The latest research results obtained on various cavity prototypes indicate that additive manufacturing has the potential to overcome the limitations of the conventional manufacturing process [15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23]. For example, the laser powder bed fusion process (L-PBF, also known as PBF-LB) [13,24,25] makes it possible to manufacture cavities made of high-purity copper, including the internal geometry, in one piece [22,23].…”

Additive Manufacturing of Side-Coupled Cavity Linac Structures from Pure Copper: A First Concept

“…As a result of continuous improvements since the 1980s, additive manufacturing processes are now being considered for the manufacturing of RF cavities. Cavity prototypes already fully or partially manufactured by AM include a radio frequency quadrupole cavity (750 MHz) [12,13], an interdigital H-mode cavity (433 MHz) [14,15], superconducting cavities (up to 11.2 GHz) [16,17], a quarter-wave cavity resonator (6 GHz) [18], and a 3 GHz drift tube cavity (DTL prototype) that we presented in 2022 [19,20]. All presented prototypes demonstrate the enormous potential of AM for cavity fabrication and motivate further studies.…”