Screening Current Simulations of Quasi-Layer-Wound and Pancake-Wound REBCO Coils

This paper reports screening current simulations of two REBCO coils with different winding approaches considered: one with quasi-layer winding and the other with pancake winding. In-house simulation models were used to calculate the screening current, Lorentz force, and mechanical stress of each coil. The comparison showed that the maximum hoop stress of a quasi-layer-wound coil was lower than that of a pancake-wound coil by more than 10%. Detailed analysis confirmed that such mitigation resulted from the benefit of a quasi-layer-wound coil. The key was that the direction of screening current induction can be manipulated, thus offsetting the superposition of the Lorentz force amplified by the screening current. This result suggests that a quasi-layer winding approach could be a competitive option in the insert module of a high-field superconducting magnet in terms of stress/strain margin…