William Atkins
Wednesday, 19 November 2008 18:57
Science -
Energy
Page 1 of 2
Because a soldered electrical connection was made incorrectly to CERN’s Large Hadron Collider, a transformer broke and a bunch of circuits between two magnets was destroyed. CERN has to cough up at least US$21 million (about 25 million francs) for the repairs.
The LHC particle accelerator will be inactive through the middle of 2009 as repairs are slowly and painstakingly made.
CERN spokesperson James Gillies stated,
"If we can do it sooner, all well and good. But I think we can do it realistically (in) early summer." [Daily Tech: “
Single Bad Solder Costs CERN’s LHC a Year, $21M USD”]
CERN officials are hoping to have the repairs completed in May or early June 2009, with the re-start of the collider scheduled tentatively now for late June 2009 or soon thereafter.
According to the inspections made on the LHC, one bad solder caused the electrical malfunction and a large helium leak in one of the sectors of the LHC.
The destroyed transformer provides power to coolants in the 17-mile underground particle accelerator.
The look-see at the problem took over
two months because the LHC is kept at super-cold temperatures. The sector where the problem occurred had to be very slowly warmed up before any visual inspections could be made.
Gillies stated,
"Now the sector is warm so they are able to go in and physically look at each of the interconnections.” [The Associated Press: “
Big particle collider repairs to cost $21 million”]
Page two continues the story on the LHC.
