CONTINUOUS FABRICATION OF HIGH-TEMPERATURE SUPERCONDUCTOR COATED METAL FIBER AND MULTIFILAMENTARY WIRE

Long superconductor fibers have been continuously produced by electrophoretically depositing REBa2Cu3O7-x (where RE = Y or a selected rare-earth element) powder onto a metal substrate fiber and sintering, then electrophoretically depositing silver and sintering. After collecting the coated fiber on a take-up spool, the entire spool is batch-oxygenated to form the 90 K superconducting phase. Multiple fibers are then continuously unspooled and soldered into a copper channel to form the final multifilamentary high-temperature superconductor wire. Superconducting fibers over 1000 m long and multifilamentary wire 70 m long have been produced.