Thermohydraulics of Resistive Transitions of the LHC Prototype Magnet String: Theoretical Modeling and Experimental Results

In preparation for the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) project, a 40 m-long prototype superconducting magnet string, representing a half-cell of the machine lattice, has been built and operated. The superconducting magnets which comprise this string normally operate in a pressurized static bath of superfluid helium at a pressure of 1 bar and at a temperature of 1.9 K. At 13.1 kA they have about 15.3 MJ of stored magnetic energy. A series of tests was performed to assess the thermohydraulics of resistive transitions (quenches) of the string of magnets. These measurements provide the necessary foundation for describing of the observed pressure rise as the combination of two processes, each acting on a different time scale. The measurements are presented and an explanatory model description of the events is given.