The Performance of the New TCDQ System in the LHC Beam Dumping Region

The superconducting quadrupole magnet Q4 and other downstream LHC machine elements risk destruction in the event of a beam dump that is not synchronised with the abort gap. In order to protect these elements, a single sided mobile graphite diluter block TCDQ, in combination with a two-sided secondary collimator TCS and iron shield TCDQM, will be installed in front of Q4. This protection system should also intercept spurious particles in the beam abort gap to prevent quenches from occurring during regular beam aborts, and must also intercept the particles from the secondary halo during low beam lifetime without provoking quenches. The conceptual design of the TCDQ system is briefly presented, with the load conditions and performance criteria. The FLUKA simulations are described results discussed in the context of the expected performance levels for LHC operation.