Setup and performance of the RHIC injector accelerators for the 2007 run with gold ions

Gold ions for the 2007 run [1] of the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) at Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) are accelerated in the Tandem, Booster and AGS prior to injection into RHIC. The setup and performance of this chain of accelerators is reviewed with a focus on improvements in the quality of beam delivered to RHIC. In particular, more uniform stripping foils between Booster and AGS, and a new bunch merging scheme in AGS have provided beam bunches with reduced longitudinal emittance for RHIC.