wiredinUSA November 2012

INDEX

New superconducting wire

into thin wire by extrusion and drawing processes. The resultant multi-filamentary thin wire is formed to N3Sn supercon- ducting wire by heat treatment. In order to realize high precision of analytical systems, it is necessary to increase the critical current density of superconducting wire. In the bronze-process, the concentration of tin (Sn) in bronze has been increased to improve the critical current density, but further improvement is limited because of the solubility limit of tin (Sn) in bronze. Hitachi Cable has succeeded in developing an Nb3Sn supercoducting wire with about 1.5 times higher critical current density by using an internal-tin process and single-stacking structure.

Hitachi Cable has announced the successful development of a niobium-tin (Nb3Sn) superconducting wire. Nb3Sn superconducting wires are widely used for superconducting magnet systems generating strong magnetic fields in nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), analytical systems and nuclear fusion facilities such as the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER). They are mainly manufactured using a method called bronze-process. In the bronze-process, the billet incorporating many niobium (Nb) cores in bronze (Cu-Sn alloy) is processed

wiredInUSA - November 2012 PRODUCTS - MACHINES TECHNOLOGY 54

wiredInUSA - November 2012

55