Progress in Copper Plating Reel-to-Reel Technology in HTS-Coated Conductor Fabrication

Copper plating technology is the efficient method for the nonvacuum metal deposition both on RABITS Ag/REBCO/Ni5%W and IBAD Ag/REBCO/YSZ/. Common to all fabrication steps is the need for increasing the production yield. Because of the Faraday law, the effective plated copper mass of 20-μm Cu layer, the plating speed is limited. Here, we report about a constructed high-rate fabrication plating unit for tapes from 4 to 12 mm width operating with a new powerful pulse plating electronics, optimum designed 12 × 10-cm-long reel-to-reel multichamber plating cells, and improved electrolytes. We have been using a new CuSO
₄
electrolyte with H
₂
SO
₄
and additives to gain the current density to 80-200 mA/cm
₂
. The maximum Cu deposition of 2 × 20 μm surround layer gives an output of about 8 m/hour. Possible corrosion and degradation effects due to overvoltage >3 V are investigated. A new concept of a multilane plating machine is proposed to deliver a plating speed of 100 m/h. The results have shown a robust reel plating process of copper deposition on coated conductors aiming at an economic step of conductor production.