Electrical joints in the CMS superconducting magnet

The Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) is one of the general-purpose detectors to be provided for the LHC project at CERN. The design field of the CMS superconducting magnet is 4 T, the magnetic length is 12.5 m and the free bore is 6 m. The CMS coil consists of five independent modules each containing four winding layers. Each winding layer is composed of a single length of aluminum stabilized and aluminum alloy reinforced conductor. Each of the four conductor lengths within a module will be electrically joined after winding is completed, and each of the five modules will be connected to the magnet bus bars during module assembly. Due to the large dimensions of the conductor and to the high current it carries, the conductor joints are sources of substantial and nontrivial joule heating during nonsteady state operation of the magnet. In addition to steady-state conditions, three transient conditions have been analyzed. The first is related to the current diffusion during a magnet transient that results in a time dependent joint resistance. The second is the current induced in a joint during a transient. The third is connected to the joint protection in case of quench. A complete analysis of the joint behavior is reported.