At the beginning of the month, workshops were held at DESY to discuss production of superconducting accelerator structures for the European XFEL superconducting linear accelerator.
Two industrial firms, Research Instruments of Germany and Zanon of Italy, have been commissioned to produce 300 accelerator structures each, starting with eight preproduction units for testing. Development of the structures is coordinated by DESY and is a joint contribution between the lab and INFN Milano.
After preproduction, another 280 serial cavities and 12 accelerator structures will be manufactured. Delivery of the serial cavities will start at the beginning of 2012 and continue for the following two years. Once they are tested at DESY, the cavities will be transferred to Saclay, Paris for assembly of the European XFEL accelerator modules.
