An innovative winding method is developed by connecting high-temperature superconducting (HTS) conductors to enable efficient construction of a magnet system for the helical fusion reactor FFHR-d1. A large-current capacity HTS conductor, referred to as STARS, is being developed by the incorporation of several innovative ideas, such as the simple stacking of state-of-the-art yttrium barium copper oxide tapes embedded in a copper jacket, surrounded by electrical insulation inside a conductor, and an outer stainless-steel jacket cooled by helium gas. A prototype conductor sample was fabricated and reached a current of 100 kA at a bias magnetic field of 5.3 T with the temperature at 20 K. At 4.2 K, the maximum current reached was 120 kA, and a current of 100 kA was successfully sustained for 1 h. A low-resistance bridge-type mechanical lap joint was developed and a joint resistance of 2 nΩ was experimentally confirmed for the conductor sample.
Development of a composite superconductor (Design-M) for research and development programs of the Large Helical Device