Fabrication of the first European full-size joint sample for ITER

The European Home Team is responsible for the design, the fabrication and t he test of the Toroidal Field Model Coil (TFMC) of the ITER project. Within this task, three full-size samples have to be fabricated in industry and t ested. Each sample is made of two parallel straight bars of full-size condu ctor, connected at bottom through a joint designed according to the EU prop osal for the ITER coils, and having at top two connections for the test fac ility. The first sample uses an ITER type Nb3Sn cable-in-conduit embedded i n a thick steel square jacket, the lower joint being similar to the inner j oints of the TFMC, The second sample uses the TFMC conductor which is an IT ER type Nb3Sn cable-in-conduit embedded in a thin steel circular jacket, th e lower joint being similar to the outer joints of the TFMC. Last, the thir d sample will use the same cable embedded in a thin incoloy jacket, fully r elevant to the ITER TF coils. This paper reports on the fabrication by Ansa ldo of the first sample, emphasizing the differences between the original d esign and the final design produced after preliminary trials, as well as po inting out the main technical issues.