Development of a Beam Loss Detection System for the CLIC Test Facility 3

The CLIC test facility 3 (CTF3) provides a 3.5A, 1.6us electron beam pulse of 150MeV at the end of the linac. The average beam power is 4 kW. Beam losses will be monitored all along the linac in order to keep the radiation level as low as possible. The heavy beam loading of the linac can lead to time transients of beam position, size and energy along the pulse. To compensate for these transients effectively, the beam loss monitor (BLM) technology must have a time response faster than a few nanoseconds. Preliminary tests have been performed in 2003 on the already existing part of the accelerator with the aim of studying the requirements for the system to be built in the future. The experimental data are compared to the results of Geant3 simulations. Based on these results, a complete beam loss detection system is currently designed for the observation of the beam transient loss and its minimization.