QUACO enters into Phase 2
by Isabel Bejar Alonso (CERN)
QUACO is a Pre Commercial Procurement (PCP) Project (Grant Agreement 689359) with key scope to procure two pilot 3.8 m quadrupole magnets with 90 mm apertures, an integrated gradient of 440 T with 120 T/m in the transverse plane and finally with an operational temperature of 1.9 K.
On 29 September last year, four companies (Antec, Elytt, Sigmaphi and Tesla) obtained a work order for Phase 1. The main milestone of this phase included:
- Conceptual Design Report of the magnet covering the results obtained in Phase 1;
- Preliminary 2D and 3D CAD model of the magnet;
- Conceptual Design Report of the Tooling including Coil fabrication tooling conceptual design and Magnet assembly tooling conceptual design;
- Development and Manufacturing plan including detailed plan for phase 2 engineering design.
Evaluators from CEA, CERN, CIEMAT and NCBJ assessed the work produced and all four tenders satisfactorily completed Phase 1.
Each one of the four contractors explored a different conceptual solution demonstrating the strength of the PCP as a method to develop innovative solutions. The summary of the results can be found on the QUACO project website.
On 12 May 2017 the successful tenderers were invited to submit their offers for Phase 2. After the evaluation of the technical and financial offers three tenderers were awarded on 30th June with a contract to execute Phase 2 of the PCP (Antec, Elytt and Sigmaphi). The main milestone of this phase included
- Detailed Magnetic and Mechanic design optimisation
- Sensitivity analysis toward fabrication
- Detailed 2D and 3D CAD manufacturing drawings of the magnet and subcomponents including instrumentation schematics
- Detailed 2D and 3D CAD drawings of the manufacturing tooling
- Manufacturing and Inspection Plan (MIP)
- Mock-ups
This phase is the engineering phase with the first mock-ups and with the complete technical solutions. The three companies have thirteen months ahead of them to demonstrate their capacity to build the future MQYY prototype. The PCP is a competitive procedure and only two of them will receive a work order for phase 3.
Pre-commercial procurement is a unique and novel procurement method in the field of accelerator components, and QUACO aims to demonstrate its full potential for success in this field.
This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 PCP programme under Grant Agreement no. 689359
