Final report for 1.7 megajoule prototype bank testing

American Control Engineering is pleased to submit to LLNL this Final Report describing the final assembly and preliminary testing of the 1.7 megajoule prototype capacitor bank that is located at our facility. The purpose of this test program was to evaluate and characterize the performance of this capacitor bank. These tests were necessary in order to proceed with the design of a final building block module that is to be used to create a reliable and cost effective multi-hundred megajoule energy storage system. The period of performance covered by this contract is from January 1, 1991 through August 31, 1992. American Control Engineering has provided all of the necessary facilities, personnel and materials that were required to perform this testing effort (except for the existing capacitor bank, the LLNL provided flashlamp assembly and E-size ignitron switch tube), An overall view of the assembled capacitor bank system as it appeared at the completion of this subcontract is shown. The initial statement-of-work for the testing and characterization of the capacitor bank was as follows: (1) Measure all of the principal electrical parameters for the 1.7 megajoule prototype capacitor bank at low voltage before proceeding to high voltage testing. This low voltage testing is to include measurement of both normal and fault current and voltage waveforms, starting with the smallest building block grouping and proceeding systematically through to the capacitor bank load. (2) Assemble and attach each of the major subsystem elements to the capacitor bank as they are required for low voltage testing including the ignition output switch structure, coaxial transmission line and load assembly. (3) Make comparison of the test results collected through low voltage testing with those forecasted by the computer mode. Evaluate and resolve any discrepancies between the two results until the computer model achieves reasonable agreement with the actual measured test results