Construction and performance of silicon detectors for the small angle spectrometers of the collider detector of fermilab

Abstract The manufacturing process of a series of position sensitive silicon detectors is described together with the tests performed to optimize the performance of the detectors. The detectors are Schottky diodes with strips on the ohmic contract which allow to determine the position of the incoming ionizing particles by charge partition. Four detectors were assembled in a telescope and tested inside the vacuum pipe of the Tevatron Collider at Fermilab. The system is a prototype of the Small Angle Silicon Spectrometer, designed primarily to study p - p elastic and diffractive cross sections, and is a part of the Collider Detector of Fermilab (CDF). Several tests were performed to check the efficiency and the linearity of response of various regions of the detectors. Scans of the beam halo were also done both in high and low β optics to check how close to the beam the detectors could be operated. Finally, the dependence of the detector response on temperature and integrated radiation dose was investigated.