🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <8400007@trsvax> pauls@trsvax.tandy.com writes:
>
>AnotherSSC question:
>
>1) How many magnets are used?
>2) In relative terms, how do they compare to other magnets in use today?
>3) What is MBTF of a magnet today (FermiLab)?
>4) How many 'up days' (up hours??) does the average collider have today?
>5) If a SSC magnet goes fubar, is the whole thing down?

I do not know the details, but the essence of the problem you are alluding 
to is that there are orders of magnitude more magnets in the SSC than at 
FNAL, and if the MTBF of the SSC systems (including power supplies and 
control systems) are the same as at FNAL -- well, it just will not work. 

This question was raised, complete with detailed numerical analysis, in 
a letter to Physics Today about a year or two ago.  The reply observed 
that this was not a new problem: if FNAL had the same systems as BNL, 
we never would have seen an experiment work at FNAL.  Engineering has 
to deal with fault tolerance and fault avoidance, and there is a major 
effort focused on just this problem.  It is a real concern, however, 
can cannot be dismissed by saying "they will solve it". 

(A good example from the excellent PBS show last night about computers: 
(the ENIAC would have stayed up for 5 seconds based on the MTBF of its 
(18000 vacuum tubes.  That it did real work was due to excellent engineering 
(and, I learned at lunch today, comparison of results from independent 
(redundant calculations a'la the Space Shuttle computer system. 

--
J. A. Carr                                    |  "The New Frontier of which I  
jac@gw.scri.fsu.edu                           |  speak is not a set of promises
Florida State University  B-186               |  -- it is a set of challenges."
Supercomputer Computations Research Institute |   John F. Kennedy (15 July 60)