Custom Manufacturing and Design of a Tube Furnace for Production of YBCO

Superconductors, while displaying phenomenal physical properties, are impractical for many applications due to their low operational temperatures. A developing solution to this problem is the usage of dopants, which may improve several qualities found in a superconducting material, such as its critical temperature and morphology, greatly improving their practicality. For the production of many ceramic superconductors, a sintering and calcination process must occur, for which we have manufactured a tube furnace using commonly available resources. Using a PID loop, we control our tube furnace with a microcontroller in conjunction with a relay, taking inputs from a thermocouple. With this setup, we managed to create a stable linear ramp and constant soak for our heating curves. For our next steps, using YBa2C3O7-ẟ as a basis for our superconductor, we will synthesize the YBCO ceramic through a citrate pyrolysis process, in which elements such as Ag and Mg will be added during the sintering process. Confirmation of the superconducting state will be visually determined by means of the Meissner effect using LN2, and data on the physical properties of the doped YBCO such as the critical temperature will then be collected using a four-wire setup.