High-intensity non-brazed heat shield for safe steady-state operation

Many plasma-facing components in today's experiments are inertially cooled. Graphite tiles are mounted on a water-cooled steel plate using a spring and bolt mechanism. When exposed to high heat flux, such a shield can take loads only for a few seconds without becoming overheated. To operate in high intensity long pulsed/steady-state conditions, new actively cooled heat shields of brazed and non-brazed types are under development. With clamped (form-locked) monoblock tiles a prototype of non-brazed heat shield structure underwent its first high heat flux tests for divertor applications in the Julich MARION ion source [1]. The test results are encouraging, and validated a finite element model as discussed in this paper.