New magnet power supply of the Birmingham proton synchrotron

This paper describes the new power supply of the Birmingham proton synchrotron which is used to produce the required field-density waveform in the main magnet air gap. After discussion of the original power supply and its control system, the design of the new power supply is described. This is a closed-loop automatic control system incorporating one loop to accurately control the field-winding currents of the two paralleled main generators, with a second overall loop of a digital nature which modifies the control program in response to preset magnet field densities. The resulting improvements to the synchrotron performance are indicated.