Turn-to-Turn Contact Resistance Measurement of No-Insulation REBCO Pancake Coils

The turn-to-turn contact resistance (characteristic resistance) is a very important factor to a no-insulation (NI) (RE)Ba-2 Cu-3O-y (REBCO) pancake coil. It characterizes the stability and charging delay of NI REBCO pancake coils. However, the ordinary sudden-discharging method cannot measure the turn-to-turn contact resistance under different conditions, such as an operating current, a temperature, and an external magnetic field. Although the turn-to-turn contact condition is strongly affected by the pressure inside of the NI REBCO coils, the feature of the contact resistance must be clarified to estimate the stability of NI REBCO coils. In this paper, we have proposed a new method to measure the turn-to-turn contact resistance applying ac current. The theory and the measurement results are also shown. The measured turn-to-turn contact resistance is reasonable, compared with that measured by the ordinary sudden-discharging method. In near future, we will measure the turn-to-turn contact resistance under different conditions by means of the proposed method.