From 1998 to 2002, the specialists of Neva-Magnet participated in the development and manufacture of the unique Dipole Magnet ALICE for the ALICE experiment at LHC in CERN (Geneva).
The work was carried out according to the contracts with the Joint Institute of Nuclear Physics (Dubna) within the framework of the international program.
The ALICE dimuon spectrometer is aiming to measure the complete spectrum of heavy quark vector mesons. An important part of the ALICE muon spectrometer is the Dipole Magnet weightening more than 800 tons and providing the field integral 3 Tm to measure the momenta of muons.
The general concept of the 800 ton Dipole Magnet is based on a window frame return yoke, fabricated from low carbon steel sheets. The flat vertical poles follow the defined acceptance angle of 9 degree. The excitation coils are of saddle type and are wound from hollow aluminium conductor. They are cooled by circulated de-mineralized water. The main flux direction in the gap is horizontal and perpendicular to the LHC beam axis.
Starting from November 2005, the magnet is in operation:
«The ALICE collaboration achieved an important milestone when they powered up the newly constructed dipole magnet for the muon spectrometer. On 9 November this very large magnet, now fully assembled in the ALICE experiment cavern, reached its full current of 6000 amps and produced a field of 670 millitesla».
CERN Bulletin Issue No. 04/2005 — Monday 24 January 2005
