Study of pretuning and high power test of DTL iris waveguide couplers using a single cell cavity

Six drift tube linac (DTL) cavities have been operating successfully at the Spallation Neutron Source (SNS). Each cavity is fed by a tapered ridge waveguide iris input coupler and a waveguide ceramic disk window. The original couplers and cavities have been in service for more than a decade. Design optimization and tuning of the couplers were initially performed prior to installation and commissioning of the cavities. Since each DTL cavity is unique, expensive, and fully utilized for neutron production, none of the cavity structure is available as a test cavity or a spare. Maintaining spares for operations and for future system upgrade, test setup of the iris couplers for precision tuning is needed. Ideally a smaller cavity structure may be used for pretuning and RF conditioning of the iris couplers as a test cavity or a bridge waveguide. In this paper, study of using a single cell cavity for the iris tuning and conditioning is presented along with the 3D simulation results.