The engineering team endeavours to continually improve and expand the capabilities and reliability of the CLF. These developments can range from small scale modifications to existing equipment to improve its performance, through to larger scale projects such as design and planning for new projects.
The engineering team start work at the initial concept to assess the feasibility of ideas, produce conceptual layouts and estimated costing and timescales. These initial concepts are converted into a detailed specification and an engineering solution developed. The engineering team project manage the manufacture, installation and commissioning of each project considering the budget and timescales available.
Example projects include:
- improvements to experimental areas with the development of an operational shutter to reduce exposure of diagnostic cameras to the laser beam during set-up and testing, which will increase the lifetime of the camera.
- improving the operational capability of the CLF's high power laser systems by designing and implementing a cooling system for the Vulcan amplifiers optics so that the repetition rate of Vulcan can be increased.
- development of thin film solid hydrogen target mounting or stress free adaptive optic mounting
- designing and providing test labs for laser development projects such as DiPOLE and the 10 PW upgrade project
