> > (unqualified) theory is that when you have a flux overload, the
> > superconductor would start to heat up. At a certain temperature point, it
> > would resume an entirely ceramic nature, which would then be unaffected by
> > EMP.
>
> Yeah, I don't know what would happen either. However, all that energy
> would have to go somewhere, and it would probably end up in heat. Even if
> that didn't happen, having gigavolts running unexpectedly through the
> control hardware would be annoying, to say the least.
>
When a magnetic field or temperature quenches a superconductor, all of
the energy carried by the superconductor is immediately dissipated at
the quench location. This has disasterous consequences, often explosive
ones, depending on how much energy is in the system. One standard
solution is to clad the superconductor with copper so the current
bypasses the quench location and the heat is diffused into the current
carrying parts of the copper cladding.
O---------------------------------O
| Hara Ra <harara@shamanics.com> |
| Box 8334 Santa Cruz, CA 95061 |
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