Ni-Cu-Co Alloy Textured Substrate for YBCO Coated Conductors

Ni_48.5Cu_48.5Co₃ alloy was studied for the realization of cube-textured substrates for YBCO coated conductors. The small amount of Co was added in order to improve the microstructure as well as the mechanical properties of the binary Ni-Cu alloy. Structural, microstructural and morphological characterizations have been carried out in order to evaluate the suitability of this substrate as a template for YBCO coated conductor application. A cube area fraction as high as 97.7% was obtained after annealing for 30 minutes at 1050degC. Further, mechanical, magnetic and electrical properties have been studied and compared with those exhibited by other Ni-based alloys. The standard CeO₂/YSZ/CeO₂/YBCO multilayer architecture was deposited on Pd-buffered substrate by means of PLD and characterized in order to verify the suitability of this template for YBCO coated conductor application. The obtained YBCO film is adherent, well textured with an out-of-plane distribution of 4.1deg (FWHM) in rolling direction and good superconducting properties with a critical temperature of about 88 K and a critical current density of 1 MA/cm². The obtained results demonstrate that this alloy tape is a good candidate for the production of YBCO-based coated conductors.