Effect of Heat Treatment on the Structure and Properties of Superconducting Nb and Nb₃Sn Electrodeposits

Criteria for Selecting Substrates for Nb3Sn Electrodeposition

“…Data on niobium electrodeposition from molten salts indicate that suitable, corrosion-resistant elemental substrate materials for Nb 3 Sn coatings are Mo, Nb, Ta, Cu, and Ni [5][6][7]. Also of interest for the fabrication of superconducting devices by galvanostegy and galvanoplastics are alloys based on these metals.…”

“…There is ample experimental evidence that mechanical strain adversely affects the superconducting properties of Nb 3 Sn [9]. At the same time, it is well known that the strain in superconducting coatings electrodeposited from melts is mainly due to the thermal expansion mismatch between the coating and substrate [7]. Therefore, in selecting substrate materials one must take into account their thermal expansion coefficient α and Young's modulus E .…”

“…The samples were then cut by spark erosion 3 − 5 mm away from the fracture surface and mounted in a holder of a scanning electron microscope. The techniques used to evaluate lattice strains by x-ray diffraction (XRD), determine lattice parameters, and investigate the superconducting properties of the coatings were similar to those described in [7,14].…”

Effect of carbon on the structure and superconducting properties of Nb3Sn coatings produced by electrocodeposition

“…The carbon content of the coatings was determined using an MKh-3301 spark-source mass spectrometer with a relative accuracy of ~20% . The techniques used to evaluate lattice strains by x-ray diffraction (XRD) and investigate the superconducting properties of the coatings were similar to those described in [22,23]. The onset of a voltage greater than 1 µ V was used as a measure of the critical current.…”

Kinetic neutron diffraction study of Nb3Sn phase formation in superconducting wires

“…The majority of information about the crystallography and microstructure of the Nb-Sn-Cu system has been obtained in this way. Investigations using techniques such as scanning electron microscopy (SEM) [1][2][3][4][5][6], transmission electron microscopy [7], laboratory x-ray diffraction measurements [8], and energy dispersive x-ray spectroscopy [9,10] have also all used the heat and quench method to analyse heat-treated samples.…”