Alcator C-Mod Run 1030611 Information

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Miniproposals
Miniproposal:318
Date Filed: 8/22/2002
Title:High Performance Operation at 5 Tesla
First Author:Earl Marmar
Session Leader:Earl Marmar (shots 1-27)

Operators
Session leader(s):Earl Marmar
Physics operator(s):Joseph Snipes
Engineering operator(s):Gary Dekow,Ed Fitzgerald

Engineering Operator Run Comment
MP#318 High Performance at 5.4 Tesla; SL:Marmar; PO:Snipes; EO:Dekow/Fit

Session Leader Plans

Physics Operators Plans

Session Leader Summaries
Entered: Jul 7 2004 03:49:33:117PM
Author: Earl Marmar
Session leader summary 1030611

MP 318: High performance H-Modes at 5 Tesla

This run was another attempt to get high power, steady H-modes.

One thing that is different about our best performance shots, compared
with more recent ones, is that the upper triangularity was lower in
the old shots. Examples of shots with stored energy greater than or
equal to 200 kJ are

960116025, 960116027, 980217015 and 1001013002.

We decreased upper triangularity to 0.3 for this run, without any
obvious benefit.

In order to try to get better EDA-ness, we ramped the toroidal field
up to about 5.7 Tesla, starting with shot 7, and also tried ramping
the current up after entering H-mode. What actually worked best to get
fairly steady EDA was to increase the target density, starting with
shot 17.

Studying RF trips on some of the steadier shots reveals once again
that a significant fraction of the RF power is not showing up in the
plasma. Results for the dW/dt analysis on shots 6, 23 and 27 show that
dW/dt is typically equal to around 45% of the change in the RF power
at the trip. For comparison, on shot 960116027, a trip which reduced
the RF power from 2.7 MW down to 1.4 MW shows a dW/dt ~ -1.2 MW,
accounting for more than 90% of the power.

Some conjectures that have been put forward with regard to the missing
power:

1) The fast (~50 keV) ions are not being confined (error fields?) 2)
Power is being lost to the edge (poor single pass absorption, effects
of BN tiles, RF physics in the edge plasma,?)

H/(H=D) was typically around 7% for this run. For comparison,
1001013002 had H/(H+D) of 7.5% at the time of maximum stored energy (W
= 233 kJ, Prf = 4.9 MW), measured using the same balmer-alpha
technique in both cases.

Note that, as Martin points out, if only 50% of the RF is effective in
heating, then radiated power fraction is much higher than we might
think, and relatively low H factors would be consistent with our
previous results at high radiated power fraction.

The RF coupling, particularly for J-port, had problems at the higher
target densities (nl04 ~ 1.2e20), although on the last shot of the day
(27), J-port did work for part of the pulse. Something that may have
helped was to delay the turn-on of J until the plasma was in H-Mode,
at which time the midplane neutral pressure has decreased.For about
100 msec, j-port power was 1.7 MW and total RF power was 4.7 MW on
this shot.

Physics Operator Summaries
Entered: Jul 7 2004 04:37:18:190PM
Author: Joseph Snipes
Engineering setup for Tuesday, 11 June 2003

Purpose: MP#318 High Performance at 5.4 Tesla

Session leader: E. Marmar
Physics operator: J. Snipes

ECDC overnight in D2 at 2e-4 Torr, stopping by 07:00.
Bake at 60 C overnight.

Run begins at 09:00 and ends at 17:00.


If RF has fired into the vacuum chamber prior to the start of the run, then
we will need to do 10 minutes of ECDC before the first shot.
Power systems setup the same as on 1030529016 (1 MA, 5.4 T, lower single null)

A-coils should be hooked up as on 1030507027 (+Dtop -Dbot -Jtop +Jbot), and
the power supply should be enabled.

Gas setup:
fill B-Top with 6 psi D2 Hybrid enabled (PG4)
fill B-side lower with 1 psi Ar Hybrid enabled (PG1)
fill B-side upper with 10 psi D2 Hybrid DISABLED (PG2) (for ECDC)
fill C-side with 30 psi D2 Hybrid enabled (PG3)

Enable the following gate valves, assuming no vacuum problems:
ECE, DNB

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
RF Setup: All 4 transmitters in Run On by 08:00. We want 5+ MW of ICRF.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Run Plan: Start by getting good EDA H-modes at 5.4 T, 1 MA, and 5 MW of ICRF
(on-axis). We will start with nl04 = 1 x 10^20 m^-2. We will use
the A-coils all the time to eliminate locked modes. ECDC should be
ready for between-shot cleaning. We will run with a small outer gap
at 0.7 cm and Z = -0.5 cm. If the H-modes are not good EDA's, we may
increase the TF to 5.6 or even 5.8 T to go to higher q. Then, we
will attempt to improve performance and get another neutron alert
by the end of the day.

One hour delay due to alternator oil tank problem.

Summary: The machine ran pretty well once the alternator oil tank problem was resolved. The run
started with shot 1030610028 due to a mistake by Josh. Shot 9 was a no power shot because the
TCI laser failed in CHECK. There were H-modes on all shots, but confinement was poor. J-port
did not work well at moderately high densities even though D and E produced better EDA
H-modes then. Except for shot 28, the other shots today had horrible looking startups and there
finally were a number of fizzles.

Scorecard: 28 shots
24 plasmas
3 fizzles
1 no power failed TCI

Shot 28: Copied shot 1030610027 but changed ZXU and RXU to reproduce 1001013002, which had lower upper
triangularity. Also increased CLEARIN by 0.005 m at 0.43 s to attempt to avoid touching the
inner wall at crossover. Good shot with several H-modes. Due to a Josh error, the first shot
of 1030611 was written as 1030610028.
Shot 01: After the mixup of shot 1030610028, we will name the second shot of today 1030611001.
Reduced nl04 to 0.9 x 10^20 m^-2. Good shot with multiple H-modes again.
Shot 02: Repeat. Good shot with multiple H-modes.
Shot 03: Repeat. Good shot with multiple H-modes, perhaps a bit worse than the previous shots.
Startup looks pretty bad, but it is still going, so Earl does not want
me to change it for now.
Shot 04: Repeat with a two step up of the ICRF. RF trips continuously. Multiple H-modes.
Shot 05: Reduced Ip request to 0.95 MA. Good shot. Several H-modes.
Shot 6: Repeat. Good shot with 4 H-modes.
Shot 07: Increased CLEARIN by 0.005 m and increased RCUR by 0.0025 m to increase the inner
gap by 0.5 cm. Also increased TF current by 10 kA from 0.6 s until 1.3 s.
Good shot with 3 H-modes.
Shot 08: Repeat except for stepping the RF up 0.1 s earlier. Good shot with a few H-modes.
Shot 09: Reduced Br0 by 0.5 mT. No power shot since the TCI laser failed in CHECK.
Shot 10: Try again. Good shot with multiple H-modes. Startup still bounces.
Shot 11: Removed Br0 change returning it to 0. Loaded wire 14 from 1030514014 to change to
NL_ZMETER density feedback rather than TCI. Programmed NL_ZMETER to 0.24 V.
Good shot with 4 H-modes.
Shot 12: Repeat. Good shot. Three EDA H-modes.
Shot 13: Reduced NL_ZMETER to 0.2 V. Good shot with several H-modes.
Shot 14: Reduced NL_ZMETER to 0.17 V and reduced argon puff from 35 to 20 ms duration. Good
shot. Several H-modes.
Shot 15: Increased prepuff by 2 ms to 25 ms duration. Good shot, but the data system
failed so that most data were not taken.
Shot 16: Good shot with lower density. Many brief H-modes more ELM-free.
Shot 17: Raise NL_ZMETER to 0.4 V. Ramp Ip from 0.8 to 0.9 s up to 1.15 MA then hold there
until 1.3 s. Good shot but RF trips considerably. A few brief H-modes.
Shot 18: Repeat to tune RF. Good shot with several brief H-modes, but RF still trips.
Shot 19: Repeat to tune RF. Good shot with several brief H-modes, but RF still trips.
Fizzle!
Shot 20: Decreased prepuff by 2 ms to 23 ms duration. Good shot, though there were some
hard x rays early. Two H-modes, one EDA about 0.5 s long.
Shot 21: Repeat to attempt to improve J-port coupling. Good shot with a long EDA H-mode
similar to shot 20.
Shot 22: Repeat. Fizzle!
Shot 23: Reduced Br0 by 0.5 mT to -0.0005 T. Good shot similar to 20 and 21.
Shot 24: Increased Ip to 1.35 MA and extended it out to 1.4 s. Disrupted at 1 s. Only
reached 1.2 MA.
Shot 25: Reload shot 23. Fizzle!
Shot 26: Repeat. Good shot but with hard x rays early. Despite 3 MW of RF, the plasma
remained in L-mode for much of the RF pulse, though there were H-modes early and
late in the RF pulse. Some CAMAC problems. No H/D data.
Shot 27: Repeat with fewer hard x rays. Good shot with a few H-modes.

Session Leader Comments
Jun 11 2003 09:13:33:820AMEarl MarmarMP 318: High performance at 5.4 Tesla

Plan: Try to optimize at 1 MA, with 3 to 6 MW total ICRF

looking back at our highest performance 1 MA shots, one difference that appears, compared to our recent campaigns,
is that the upper triangularity was lower, around 0.3. The shots I looked at are

960116025, 960116027, 980217015, and 1001013002.

We will start from the last shot yesterday, 1030610027, but decrease the upper triangularity.
Jun 11 2003 11:20:28:197AM1030611003Earl Marmarratty H-mode; still looking too ELM-free; many back transitions

steady RF for almost 400 msec; edge of j-port antenna appears to be spewing at 0.9s and after
Jun 11 2003 11:30:36:913AM1030611004Earl Marmarreprogram RF to give 3 MW for .2 s, then increase to 4.5 MW

similar ratty H-modes; more RF trips


Jun 11 2003 12:47:41:577PM1030611005Earl Marmardrop Ip to 900 kA

some evidence of EDA from reflectometer and PCI


Jun 11 2003 12:50:04:437PM1030611007Earl Marmarincrease TF during RF pulse, to 5.78 T (160 kA) in attempt to get more EDA-like

RF slightly off-axis (~5 cm)

Seems to heat in the center
Jun 11 2003 12:54:14:987PM1030611008Earl Marmarmove RF power increase 100 ms earlier; try to keep it from making the first back-transition

at least 3 H-modes; second seems best; RF tripping

2'nd H-Mode looks EDA-ish; H89 ~ 1.25 at 5.1 MW RF power; Rdd = 2e13/sec
Jun 11 2003 01:17:59:083PM1030611010Earl Marmarno changes

first H-mode is the least bad; H89 ~ 1.2
Jun 11 2003 01:47:10:107PM1030611012Earl Marmarfirst H-mode is slightly better

Rdd peaks at 2.5e13 /sec
Jun 11 2003 01:59:39:367PM1030611013Earl Marmarlower target density by 10%

no tci, but z-meter signal did not decrease

slightly worse confinement (Rdd ~ 2.0e13 /sec)
Jun 11 2003 02:19:53:520PM1030611014Earl Marmarrepeat

similar to 13; lots of rf trips; briefly at 5.4 MW, Rdd peaks at 2.4e13/sec
Jun 11 2003 03:05:23:650PM1030611017Earl Marmarhigher density (nl_04~1.2e20); put in a current ramp-up to 1.1 MA after in H-Mode

not much difference; RF trips at 0.88s, Rdd = 1.6e13/sec
Jun 11 2003 03:21:00:770PM1030611018Earl Marmarrepeat

definitely EDA H-modes, especially the second one. No J-port power; semi-decent H-mode with 2.9 MW from D and E
Jun 11 2003 03:52:51:077PM1030611020Earl Marmarlong 3 MW EDA H-modes; Rdd ~ 1.5e13/sec
Jun 11 2003 04:00:00:410PM1030611021Earl Marmarrepeat; similar to 20
Jun 12 2003 04:22:14:697PM1030611023Earl MarmarThere was an RF trip (D port) on this shot, at 1.12 seconds, in the middle of a quite steady EDA H-Mode.
The RF power dropped from 3 MW to about 1.6 MW. Bob Granetz ran EFIT on a 1 ms timescale (EFIT18 tree).
It appears that at the RF power decrease, dW/dt ~ -0.6 MW +/- 0.1 MW. This can be compared with the decrease in
RF power of 1.35 MW, possibly implying that only about 45% of the RF is being absorbed by the plasma.
Jun 11 2003 05:03:19:960PM1030611024Earl Marmartry to ramp up to 1.3 MA

Got to 1.2 MA, got stuck there and then disrupted; went outboard limited before the disruption.
Jun 11 2003 05:03:47:630PM1030611026Earl Marmarback to settings from shot 23. Got 3 MW of RF with a very long l-mode period.
Jun 11 2003 05:28:40:447PM1030611027Earl Marmarrepeat.

Got 5 MW for 80 msec, Rdd up to 2.7e13/sec, H89 ~ 1.0

H/(H+D) ~ 0.07

Physics Operator Comments
Jun 11 2003 08:47:04:930AMJoseph SnipesEngineering setup for Tuesday, 11 June 2003

Purpose: MP#318 High Performance at 5.4 Tesla

Session leader: E. Marmar
Physics operator: J. Snipes

ECDC overnight in D2 at 2e-4 Torr, stopping by 07:00.
Bake at 60 C overnight.

Run begins at 09:00 and ends at 17:00.


If RF has fired into the vacuum chamber prior to the start of the run, then
we will need to do 10 minutes of ECDC before the first shot.
Power systems setup the same as on 1030529016 (1 MA, 5.4 T, lower single null)

A-coils should be hooked up as on 1030507027 (+Dtop -Dbot -Jtop +Jbot), and
the power supply should be enabled.

Gas setup:
fill B-Top with 6 psi D2 Hybrid enabled (PG4)
fill B-side lower with 1 psi Ar Hybrid enabled (PG1)
fill B-side upper with 10 psi D2 Hybrid DISABLED (PG2) (for ECDC)
fill C-side with 30 psi D2 Hybrid enabled (PG3)

Enable the following gate valves, assuming no vacuum problems:
ECE, DNB

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
RF Setup: All 4 transmitters in Run On by 08:00. We want 5+ MW of ICRF.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Run Plan: Start by getting good EDA H-modes at 5.4 T, 1 MA, and 5 MW of ICRF
(on-axis). We will start with nl04 = 1 x 10^20 m^-2. We will use
the A-coils all the time to eliminate locked modes. ECDC should be
ready for between-shot cleaning. We will run with a small outer gap
at 0.7 cm and Z = -0.5 cm. If the H-modes are not good EDA's, we may
increase the TF to 5.6 or even 5.8 T to go to higher q. Then, we
will attempt to improve performance and get another neutron alert
by the end of the day.
Jun 11 2003 10:21:32:510AMJoseph SnipesShot 28: Copied shot 1030610027 but changed ZXU and RXU to reproduce 1001013002, which had lower upper
triangularity. Also increased CLEARIN by 0.005 m at 0.43 s to attempt to avoid touching the
inner wall at crossover. Good shot with several H-modes. Due to a Josh error, the first shot
of 1030611 was written as 1030610028.
Jun 11 2003 08:56:18:900AM1030611001Joseph SnipesA problem appeared with an oil tank for the alternator so that the alternator is now spinning down. There
will be a delay in the run.
Jun 11 2003 09:11:08:510AM1030611001Joseph SnipesOne hour to 1.5 hour delay due to the alternator oil tank problem.
Jun 11 2003 10:36:51:540AM1030611001Joseph SnipesShot 01: After the mixup of shot 1030610028, we will name the second shot of today 1030611001.
Reduced nl04 to 0.9 x 10^20 m^-2. Good shot with multiple H-modes again.
Jun 11 2003 10:54:54:167AM1030611002Joseph SnipesShot 02: Repeat. Good shot with multiple H-modes.
Jun 11 2003 11:13:22:587AM1030611003Joseph SnipesShot 03: Repeat. Good shot with multiple H-modes, perhaps a bit worse than the previous shots.
Startup looks pretty bad, but it is still going, so Earl does not want
me to change it for now.
Jun 11 2003 11:29:16:057AM1030611004Joseph SnipesShot 04: Repeat with a two step up of the ICRF. RF trips continuously. Multiple H-modes.
Jun 11 2003 11:41:00:570AM1030611005Joseph SnipesShot 05: Reduced Ip request to 0.95 MA. Good shot. Several H-modes.
Jun 11 2003 12:04:41:010PM1030611006Joseph SnipesShot 6: Repeat. Good shot with 4 H-modes.
Jun 11 2003 12:09:12:970PM1030611007Joseph SnipesShot 07: Increased CLEARIN by 0.005 m and increased RCUR by 0.0025 m to increase the inner
gap by 0.5 cm. Also increased TF current by 10 kA from 0.6 s until 1.3 s.
Good shot with 3 H-modes.
Jun 11 2003 12:36:55:300PM1030611008Joseph SnipesShot 08: Repeat except for stepping the RF up 0.1 s earlier. Good shot with a few H-modes.
Jun 11 2003 12:44:52:870PM1030611009Joseph SnipesShot 09: Reduced Br0 by 0.5 mT. No power shot since the TCI laser failed in CHECK.
Jun 11 2003 01:10:38:000PM1030611010Joseph SnipesShot 10: Try again. Good shot with multiple H-modes. Startup still bounces.
Jun 11 2003 01:23:50:730PM1030611011Joseph SnipesShot 11: Removed Br0 change returning it to 0. Loaded wire 14 from 1030514014 to change to
NL_ZMETER density feedback rather than TCI. Programmed NL_ZMETER to 0.24 V.
Good shot with 4 H-modes.
Jun 11 2003 01:36:16:490PM1030611012Joseph SnipesShot 12: Repeat. Good shot. Three EDA H-modes.
Jun 11 2003 01:54:23:143PM1030611013Joseph SnipesShot 13: Reduced NL_ZMETER to 0.2 V. Good shot with several H-modes.
Jun 11 2003 02:03:31:227PM1030611014Joseph SnipesShot 14: Reduced NL_ZMETER to 0.17 V and reduced argon puff from 35 to 20 ms duration. Good
shot. Several H-modes.
Jun 11 2003 02:30:37:047PM1030611015Joseph SnipesShot 15: Increased prepuff by 2 ms to 25 ms duration. Good shot, but the data system
failed so that most data were not taken.
Jun 11 2003 02:45:04:887PM1030611016Joseph SnipesShot 16: Good shot with lower density. Many brief H-modes more ELM-free.
Jun 11 2003 03:01:40:650PM1030611017Joseph SnipesShot 17: Raise NL_ZMETER to 0.4 V. Ramp Ip from 0.8 to 0.9 s up to 1.15 MA then hold there
until 1.3 s. Good shot but RF trips considerably. A few brief H-modes.
Jun 11 2003 03:20:18:537PM1030611019Joseph SnipesShot 18: Repeat to tune RF. Good shot with several brief H-modes, but RF still trips.
Jun 11 2003 03:24:57:977PM1030611019Joseph SnipesShot 19: Repeat to tune RF. Good shot with several brief H-modes, but RF still trips.
Fizzle!
Jun 11 2003 03:39:31:130PM1030611020Joseph SnipesShot 20: Decreased prepuff by 2 ms to 23 ms duration. Good shot, though there were some
hard x rays early. Two H-modes, one EDA about 0.5 s long.
Jun 11 2003 04:00:13:710PM1030611021Joseph SnipesShot 21: Repeat to attempt to improve J-port coupling. Good shot with a long EDA H-mode
similar to shot 20.
Jun 11 2003 04:05:40:870PM1030611022Joseph SnipesShot 22: Repeat. Fizzle!
Jun 11 2003 04:22:28:180PM1030611023Joseph SnipesShot 23: Reduced Br0 by 0.5 mT to -0.0005 T. Good shot similar to 20 and 21.
Jun 11 2003 04:34:32:780PM1030611024Joseph SnipesShot 24: Increased Ip to 1.35 MA and extended it out to 1.4 s. Disrupted at 1 s. Only
reached 1.2 MA.
Jun 11 2003 04:43:27:257PM1030611025Joseph SnipesShot 25: Reload shot 23. Fizzle!
Jun 11 2003 05:02:41:897PM1030611026Joseph SnipesShot 26: Repeat. Good shot but with hard x rays early. Despite 3 MW of RF, the plasma
remained in L-mode for much of the RF pulse, though there were H-modes early and
late in the RF pulse. Some CAMAC problems. No neutron and H/D data.
Jun 11 2003 05:09:22:027PM1030611027Joseph SnipesShot 27: Repeat with fewer hard x rays. Good shot with a few H-modes.
Jun 11 2003 05:13:39:360PM1030611027Joseph SnipesSummary: The machine ran pretty well once the alternator oil tank problem was resolved. The run
started with shot 1030610028 due to a mistake by Josh. Shot 9 was a no power shot because the
TCI laser failed in CHECK. There were H-modes on all shots, but confinement was poor. J-port
was unable to function at moderately high densities even though D and E produced better EDA
H-modes then. So, it seems that J-port is a low density AT antenna, but not for conventional
high performance shots at high density. Except for shot 28, the other shots today had horrible
looking startups and there finally were a number of fizzles. Shot 27 was the worst startup
that went in history!

Scorecard: 28 shots
24 plasmas
3 fizzles
1 no power failed TCI

Engineering Operator Comments
ShotTimeTypeStatusComment
110:29:49:773AMPlasmaOk
210:42:28:807AMPlasmaOk
310:55:28:243AMPlasmaOk
411:23:23:290AMPlasmaOk
511:36:11:430AMPlasmaOk
611:49:02:963AMPlasmaOk
712:04:21:603PMPlasmaOk
812:26:26:340PMPlasmaOk
912:39:23:460PMPlasmaBadLost TCI Gas Laser Feedback, No Power Shot
1001:04:32:433PMPlasmaOk
1101:18:25:117PMPlasmaOk
1201:32:49:080PMPlasmaOk
1301:45:52:200PMPlasmaOk
1401:58:53:507PMPlasmaOk
1502:25:01:633PMPlasmaOk
1602:39:32:787PMPlasmaOk
1702:52:39:327PMPlasmaOk
1803:06:02:040PMPlasmaOk
1903:19:53:427PMPlasmaOk
2003:32:57:407PMPlasmaOk
2103:49:36:340PMPlasmaOk
2204:02:26:273PMPlasmaOk
2304:15:21:063PMPlasmaOk
2404:28:18:667PMPlasmaOk
2504:41:35:020PMPlasmaOk
2604:54:17:233PMPlasmaOk
2705:07:10:667PMPlasmaOk