High power RF operations studies at TARLA facility

Abstract

Turkish Accelerator and Radiation Laboratory (TARLA) is a facility capable of accelerating an electron beam up to 40 MeV. Two beamlines were proposed to generate free-electron laser radiation and bremsstrahlung. The accelerator employs two normal conducting cavities, so-called buncher cavities: subharmonic buncher (SHB) and fundamental buncher (FB), and two cryomodules that house two TESLA cavities each. SHB operates in 260 MHz and FB in 1.3 GHz, and is powered by 1.5 kW and 500 W radio frequency (RF) amplifiers, respectively. Each TESLA cavity is driven by 18 kW saturated high-power solid-state amplifiers (SSA). In addition, a L band pulse compressor system is designed and implemented at the facility to actively promote high-power RF research. Currently, setup of a resonant ring test bench is approved to test the RF components under high power RF conditions. This paper describes the TARLA high power RF, RF controller, and network structures. High power tests and measurements of the RF components of the TARLA beamline are given. Outcomes from the operation of the L band pulse compressor are explained, and the resonant ring test stand is stated as a summary.