OLAV-V<br> 5th workshop on the Operation of LArge Vacuum systems

History of the OLAV Workshops

Introduction

It will be seen from the following brief history of the OLAV series of workshops how the goals of the ?workshop have evolved to better meet the challenges of advancing technology and evolving programs. ?Initial these workshops were directed towards the accelerator community but have now been expanded ?with the emergence of the larger fusion machines to the professionals of that community who are faced with?many of the same challenges while still retaining the workshop emphasis on accelerator technology.

The acronym, OLAV, is derived from the specific focus for these workshops " Operation of LArge Vacuum ?systems" and was branded with the OLAV logo at the first OLAV workshop, OLAV I held at CERN. ?The correct pronunciation for OLAV is " oo-lahf ".

It can be argued that the 41st IUVSTA Workshop, Vacuum System Design for Particle Accelerators: a multi- disciplinary approach held June 21- 24, 2004 at Brdo pri Kranju, Slovenia was for all practical purposes the pre curser to the OLAV series of workshops.

Following the success of the Slovenia workshop Noel Hilleret of CERN had the vision see the benefits of continuing this type of forum where the accelerator community could meet on a regular basis to discuss common issues and challenges that they all faced. Noel took up the banner and pressured the accelerator community to continue the dialog that had been started and offered to host OLAV I at CERN. Noel and his team worked tirelessly to make it happen. Without Noel OLAV would not have got off the ground and he needs to be congratulated on his vision and persistence in pursuing a goal of continuing dialog that would benefit the accelerator community at large. Noel, the community thanks you and the fulfillment of your vision can be seen as OLAV strengthens with each workshop.


41st IUVSTA Workshop

The 41st IUVSTA Workshop was held June 21 - 24, 2004 at Brdo pri Kranju, Slovenia and organized by the Institute of Metals and Technology (IMT), Ljubljana, Slovenia.

As will be seen from the workshop summary the targeted audience and the goals of the workshop were very similar to those of the OLAV series of workshops and can therefore be considered a pre-curser to OLAV.

The 41st IUVSTA Workshop http://www.imt.si/iuvsta/ was aimed at professionals involved in designing or working with all types of particle accelerators, ranging from the largest colliding beam machines to small industrial accelerators, who would be able to contribute their expertise, whether dealing with modest vac- uum levels or XHV. In addition it was considered that others working in closely related areas, particularly with large scale vacuum systems, would also be able to contribute insights and experience. With the goal to seek, discern and understand commonality of approaches, procedures and processes.

The workshop would place some emphasis on understanding the ways in which vacuum is important for p- articular types of accelerator and why residual atmospheres may place limitations on the operation of acc- elerators. Examples of this might be bremsstrahlung production in cyclotrons or synchrotron light sources and electron cloud production in large hadron colliders, although there will be many others.

Topics such as outgassing and desorption were discussed with practical methods of reducing these to acc- eptable levels for both room temperature and cryogenic machines. Other topics included design tools for calculating gas flows and pressure distributions in complex systems. Pumping techniques and measurement of total and partial pressures in often hostile environments were included among the topics covered.

The organizing committee for the 41st IUVSTA Workshop was:
    • F. Mazzolini (Italy) - chair
    • J.Setina (Slovenia) - co-chair, in charge for the local organization
    • F. Dylla (USA)
    • R. Kersevan (France)
    • R. Reid (United Kingdom)
    • Y. Saito (Japan)
    • P. Strubin (Switzerland)
    • K. Zapfe (Germany)

OLAV I Workshop

The OLAV I Workshop was held April 11 - 12, 2005 at CERN, ?http://olav-workshop.web.cern.ch/olav-workshop/ Geneva, Switzerland.

The goals for the OLAV workshops were initially developed by the OLAV I organizing committee to fulfill an identified need.

"Teams in charge of the operation of large vacuum systems are faced with a set of technical challenges which have not, to our knowledge, been discussed in any forum up to now. With a view to trying to fill this gap, we propose organizing a first Workshop on the Operation of Large Vacuum Systems to be held at CERN (Geneva, Switzerland) on 11th-12th April 2005" to address this short fall."
"This Workshop is aimed at colleagues directly involved (or who will be) in the operation of large vacuum systems, and will focus on practical subjects, more specifically on accelerator vacuum systems. It will pro- vide a periodic forum in which participants will present and compare their experiences by oral presentations and extensive discussions. This workshop will be organized around 5 predefined topics which will be cov- ered by invited speakers who will, with their presentations, introduce a discussion on:
    • Presentation of the participants' vacuum systems
    • Our experience with industrial products
    • Vacuum failures and recovery procedures
    • Vacuum systems in radioactive environments
    • Accelerator vacuum components (pumps, valves, fast valves.)"

The organizing committee for the OLAV I Workshop was:
    • N. Hilleret, CERN, Switzerland
    • D. Hseuh, BNL , USA
    • R. Reid, ASTeC , UK
    • L. Westerberg, TSL, Sweden
    • K. Zapfe, DESY, Germany

Following the workshop a "Workshop Evaluation" was undertaken to solicit comments from the participants to be feed into the organization and program of OLAV II.

The OLAV I workshop was attended by 49 participants; unfortunately there was no rogues gallery.

OLAV II Workshop

The OLAV II Workshop was held March 10 - 12, 2008 at the Daresbury Laboratory ?http://www.cockcroft.ac.uk/events/OLAVII/ Daresbury, Cheshire UK.

While the overall goals remained unchanged the workshop was expanded to include participants from ITER which was entering the construction phase following agreement between the countries involved in the project. The ITER presentation was limited to one introductory talk addressing the challenges to be faced in the vacuum and leak detection areas.

One of the recommendations of the OLAV I workshop evaluation that was implemented in OLAV II was to limit discussions following each presentation and introduce a summary discussion at the conclusion to each session. Feedback on this change was mixed.

The following sessions were included in the workshop program which incorporated topics resulting from the OLAV I workshop evaluation:
    • Latest Developments at Institutes
    • Vacuum Systems - Operational Issues
    • Reducing Outgassing / Surface Preparation
    • Control Systems and Interlocking
    • NEG, TSP, Special Coatings
    • OLAV - Long Term Experience
    • Vacuum Challenges for ITER & next generation Large Vacuum Systems
    • Vacuum Components

The organizing committee for the OLAV II Workshop was:
    • Joe Herbert, ASTeC, United Kingdom
    • Matthew Cox, Diamond, United Kingdom
    • Noel Hilleret, CERN, Switzerland
    • Gao-Yu Hsiung, NSRRC, Taiwan
    • Fabio Mazzolini, Elettra, Italy
    • Ron Reid, ASTeC, United Kingdom

OLAV III Workshop

The OLAV III Workshop was held July 11-14, 2011 at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), http://neutrons.ornl.gov/conf/OLAV2011/welcome_olav.html/ Oak Ridge, Tennessee, USA.

The discussion format will again be revised as a result of the OLAV II evaluation and a discussion period will follow each presentation together with a summary panel discussion at the end of each day.

The program for OLAV III was developed and addressed a number of the suggestions noted by the parti- cipants in the evaluation of OLAV II. Besides, an open Forum (discussion) was held in which participants were joined by technical representatives from the vacuum equipment manufactures community. This session ran about 60 - 90 minutes in a question and answer format covering a range of topics from the operational issues with current equipment, emerging technologies and future equipment requirements for next generation machines. The sessions in the workshop program were included:
    • Latest developments at Institutes
    • Operational issues and long term experiences
    • Vacuum Failures & Recovery
    • Advances in vacuum technology, components, coatings etc.
    • Vacuum component forum with industry
    • Technology of long pulse fusion machines (fusion session)

The organizing committee for the OLAV III Workshop is:
    • Peter Ladd (Chair) ORNL, USA
    • Joe Herbert (Passed chair) ASTeC, United Kingdom
    • Hsiao-chaun (Dick) Hseuh BNL, USA
    • Gao-Yu Hsiung NSRRC, Taiwan
    • Jeremy Price ORNL, USA
    • Janez Setina IMT, Slovenia
    • Ray Veness CERN, Switzerland

OLAV IV Workshop
The OLAV IV Workshop was held April 1st-4th 2014 at the NSRRC, Hsinchu, Taiwan.

This was a very fruitful workshop with very good discussions. As particulate cleaning
becomes more importnant, it was decided to add this to the topical list for the
next workshop.

The organizing committee for the OLAV IV Workshop is:
    • Gao-Yu Hsiung (Chair) NSRRC, Taiwan
    • Peter Ladd  (OLAV III Chair) ESS, Sweden
    • Joe Herbert (OLAV II Chair) ASTeC, United Kingdom
    • Hsiao-chaun (Dick) Hseuh BNL, USA
    • Yoshio Saito, KEK, Japan
    • Marcelo Ferreira, SLAC, USA
    • Paolo Chiggiato,  CERN, Switzerland


Disclaimer:
Most of this material was taken form the original OLAV IV web site.