| The goal of this research is to fabricate and characterize the Ag-sheathed BiSrCaCuO (BSCCO) tapes using a combination of alternating current electric field assisted electrophoretic deposition (ACEPD) and thermomechanical consolidation (TMC) technique. In this method, an alternating current (AC) electric field was applied in conjunction to the direct current (DC) electric field. This AC field parallel to substrate surface was found to assist c-axis texturing of BSCCO film.;Higher uni-axial pressure and temperature for thermomechanical consolidation enhance and reduce the size and number density of micro-pores. The effect of processing variables on the microstructure of BSCCO tapes was investigated in detail. The high AC field operating at high frequencies and low DC field were found to improve the c-axis texture. To improve the c-axis texture, several novel concepts were investigated in this research, namely, (i) AC-assisted EPD and (ii) thermomechanical consolidation. Such improved green film microstructure led to better superconductivity stability. The introduction of Ag-particle interlayer into the middle of BSCCO film forms the strong two-dimensional Ag-BSCCO composite, leading to the improved fracture strength and adhesion.;T-peel fracture test, scanning electron microscopy, x-ray diffractometry, and SQUID magnetometry characterization results were correlated to c-axis texturing enhancement and BSCCO tape/wire processing parameters. The effects of superconductivity changes by pre-sintering microstructure control with thermomechanical consolidation parameters were discussed.;The AC field assisted electrophoretic deposition mechanism for c-axis texture enhancement was modeled by simulating the trajectory of anisotropic particle in suspension. Differential equations to demonstrate the angular motion behavior of the particle was developed. Good agreement was observed before the experimental results and numerical calculations. |
