Critical Current Simulation and Measurement of Second Generation, High-Temperature Superconducting Coil under External Magnetic Field

This paper studies the critical current of second generation, high temperature superconducting coils under an external magnetic field experimentally and numerically. Two identical coils with different coated conductors are fabricated and tested under a direct current (DC) magnetic field along the axis of the coil. Then, a numerical model in cylindrical coordinates based on a sheet current model is built by taking the measured magnetic field dependency to analyze the current distribution and magnetic field distribution. The simulated critical currents of the coils under the DC magnetic field have good agreement with the measured results. We find that under the in-phase field, the critical current decreases as the magnetic field in the innermost turn is enhanced by the external field. Meanwhile, the anti-phase external field increases the critical current a bit at first, then decreases the critical current. We further discuss the critical current criteria of the coils, showing that the parallel field plays a more important role in critical current determination.