Design and development of CRIO based data acquisition and control system for high voltage bushing experiment

In Diagnostic Neutral Beam (DNB), High Voltage (HV) bushing is an interface between the HV transmission line and Beam source. For validating the design of HVB of DNB, a scaled down configuration of the Bushing is fabricated, referred to as PHVB and assembled. This PHVB is to be subjected to long duration HV tests up to 60 kV under vacuum conditions for verifying the voltage holding capacity of the bushing. For automating the entire experimental process of HVB experiment and acquiring important experimental data up to 3600 sec for post analysis, a dedicated Data Acquisition and Control System (DACS) is required. This will help in understanding the behavior of the PHVB in High voltage and vacuum environment. Also it is required that high speed breakdown events are monitored. CRIO (compact reconfigurable input output) is a rugged, small sized hardware platform which combines the power of real time processor and FPGA bus. It is becoming an upcoming standard for medium sized experiment. For ensuring smooth control operation of the experiment; NI CRIO was selected as the controller for DACS. In this experiment the CRIO provides a user interface for setting of important control set points of power supply and vacuum system. Also it provides seamless control and acquisition for pulse durations of up to 3600 sec. The voltage signal is generated as a ramp signal with upper voltage set point. The ramp rate applied is 1.5 kV/min and is user configurable. The testing of PHVB has been successfully completed using the developed DACS. In this paper the technical details of DACS design, implementation and test results shall be discussed. (author)