Degradation studies of Fermilab low beta-quadrupole cable

This paper reports on the production of high gradient superconducting quadrupoles for the Tevatron DO/BO Low Beta insertion that is currently underway at Fermilab. The two-shell design utilizes a 36-strand Rutherford style cable produced by Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory. A measure of cable quality is usually given by a comparison of the critical current of the cable with the sum of the critical currents of the strand. A recent study involving variations in the cabling conditions and dimensional parameters has resulted in a significant decrease in degradation. Over the period of cable production degradation has been reduced from an average of 12% to less than 4%