A US student has designed giant storage stands capable of supporting up to 45,000 pounds of superconducting magnets for the world’s first electron-ion accelerator (EIC).
The four-tiered stands were designed by Robert Desjardins, a mechanical engineering senior at Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT), and his mentor, EIC mechanical engineer Jonathon Greene. The structures will store superconducting magnets from Brookhaven National Laboratory’s (BNL) Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC).
Around 80 magnets are to be removed from the RHIC. They must be saved during the transition to the EIC. Some of the equipment could later be reused as spare parts for the new machine.
According to the team, individual magnets can weigh up to 12,000 pounds. Because storage space was limited, engineers opted for a vertical solution instead. “Floor space is at a premium,” Greene said. “So, build up instead of building up.”
Stack giant magnets
The team had stored the magnets on three-tier stands where ceiling space was limited. The new design, however, expands this to four levels. It is also strong enough to safely bear the enormous loads. “That’s what these stands are for,” Greene explained. “We have so many magnets that we need to store.”
However, adding a fourth level required updating a decades-old design. Desjardins began redesigning the structure during his DOE summer internship at the facility. He worked from a design documented in hand-drawn plans from the 1990s.
Photo credit: David Rahner / Brookhaven National Laboratory
“One of the challenges was to reduce the cost but also to strengthen the stands so that they were strong enough to hold four magnets,” Desjardins explained. The first draft came 10 weeks later. “It was a lot of analysis,” Greene revealed. “But I don’t think I changed its design all that much.”
The student then contacted local manufacturers and discovered off-the-shelf components that were cheaper than the custom parts used in the 1990s design. The first stand of his design arrived in June.
The stand also had to withstand potential earthquakes without compromising the safety of the stored magnets. To ensure it meets these requirements, engineers subjected the prototype to several safety and structural tests. This included buckling, static load, modal and seismic analyses.
Reusing magnets for the EIC
After safety testing was completed, Greene confirmed that the stand met today’s construction standards. He assumes that with his mentee’s design, around 80 magnets will be stored by RHIC for the EIC. “Rob successfully designed the stands to withstand over 45,000 pounds,” Greene said.
The team plans to save one of each type of RHIC magnet. Desjardins’ redesign is expected to save the project about $420,000. Desjardins noted that watching his design become a real structure was a unique experience. “It’s incredible to see something I designed in a 10-week summer get built in real life,” the Long Island native said in a press release.
RHIC operated for 26 years. It used superconducting magnets to focus and direct particle beams around its 2.4-mile-long rings. BNL teams began removing parts from the accelerator in April as preparations for its successor progressed.
The team’s goal is to obtain viable magnets that are not immediately needed. The EIC will reuse significant portions of the existing RHIC infrastructure, including one of its ion storage rings. A new electron accelerator and storage ring will also be built.
Unlike the RHIC, in which heavy ions and protons collided, the EIC smashes electrons into protons and atomic nuclei. Researchers will use these collisions to study the internal structure of matter and how quarks and gluons, the fundamental particles responsible for building protons and neutrons, behave inside atomic nuclei.
