DESIGN AND RESEARCH-AND-DEVELOPMENT RESULTS OF THE JOINTS FOR THE ITER CONDUCTOR

In the scope of the Engineering Design Activity (EDA) for ITER (Intern ational Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor), a R&D task has been launc hed in 1993 for development, manufacturing and testing of subsize and full size joints, to be used in the layer-to-layer and pancake-to-panc ake connections of the ITER coils, A set of design criteria and manufa cturing choices is initially agreed as a common basis for the work car ried out in parallel by the four ITER parties (Japan, European Union, United States, Russian Federation), The staged work includes variation s of layout parameters in subsize samples, technological investigation s for manufacturing methods and performance analysis, As a last stage of the task, full size joint samples, manufactured from sections of th e ITER conductors, are tested in the PTF and SULTAN test facilities un der ITER relevant operating conditions.