A15 multifilamentary superconductors by the infiltration process

The inherent brittleness of the A15 compounds, and the requirement for a filamentary morphology, led to a heavy reliance on a powder approach for the preparation of superconducting tapes and wires. The quench-age technique, a non-powder process, was employed for the niobium-aluminum system, following the special features of the equilibrium phase diagram. The powder approach proved particularly effective for binaries, such as Nb-Sn, and for the ternaries Nb(Al,Ge) and Nb(Al,Si). Two variations of the powder process were assessed. One involved the use of precompounded powder of the desired stoichiometry but required simultaneous application of heat and pressure. The second variation was the infiltration process. This process involves the preparation of a ductile niobium matrix containing a controlled network of interconnected pores which are subsequently infiltrated with liquid metals (Sn) or low melting-point eutectics (e.g., Al-Ge, Al-Si). The composite is then subjected to a thermomechanical treatment to form a multiply connected array of A15 filaments in a niobium matrix. Multifilamentary conductors, based on Nb3Sn, Nb3Al, Nb3 (Al,Ge) and Nb3 (Al,Si), were readily obtained. Nb3Sn conductors made by the infiltration process exhibit a critical temperature (Tc) of 18.1 K and a critical current carrying capacity (I/sub c/) of 8 x 104 amp.cm-2 at 12 Tesla