At 9:00 AM on Wednesday, February 23, 2005, Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) will host a vendor information meeting on the NCSX Modular Coil Assembly Fixture (MCAF). The meeting will be held at PPPL in Plainsboro, New Jersey. The meeting is expected to take about 2 hours, including time for questions and answers, and will conclude with an optional tour of PPPL. The MCAF is required to facilitate assembly of the National Compact Stellarator Experiment (NCSX), a magnetic fusion research device jointly designed by PPPL and Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), and currently under construction at PPPL. Because of the complex shape and extremely close tolerances of the NCSX vacuum vessel and its surrounding modular coil (MC), assembly must proceed in precisely controlled stages. Placing the half period MC assembly over the NCSX vacuum vessel requires a specially built external assembly fixture that will manipulate the MC half period over the vacuum vessel. This fixture (the MCAF) will require a detailed design and fabrication effort. At the information meeting, PPPL intends to provide information on the MCAF preliminary design in order to obtain industry feedback on its manufacturability. We also intend to gage potential supplier interest and provide an opportunity for supplier networking and team formation. To provide interested parties with advance information, a zip file titled MCAF-050201 has been placed an MCAF sub-folder on the PPPL NCSX manufacturing ftp site. The Zip file contains PDF drawings, DXF files, a servo table listing and an assembly STEP file of the MCAF Reference Design and PDF drawing files of the modular coil winding forms. The site also contains a draft MCAF specification (NCSX-CSPEC-18-01-00-dA) and two animation clips (se188-000-iso.mpg and se185-000-top.mpg). All files can be accessed via the MCAF web page at http://ncsx.pppl.gov/NCSX_MFG/MCAF_mfg.htm. Parties interested in attending the information session should send an email registration request to the PPPL Procurement Division Administrator (email
[email protected], telephone 609-243-2428, fax 609-243-2021) not later than Friday, February 18, 2005. The request must include the company name and address, telephone number, fax number, and the full names and citizenship of each attending representative. To be admitted to the Laboratory, all attendees display a photo ID issued by a Governmental authority (e.g., passport or driver’s license). PPPL is operated by Princeton University under contract to the United States Department of Energy, and is located on Princeton University’s James Forrestal Campus, off U.S. Route 1 approximately 2 miles north of the town of Princeton. Detailed travel Information, including maps, driving instructions and Laboratory entrance procedures, can be obtained at http://www.pppl.gov/about_pppl/pages/driving_instr_pppl.html. Information about the NCSX Project may be obtained at http://ncsx.pppl.gov//index.html. Information about PPPL and its research programs may be obtained at www.pppl.gov.