A new 18-T resistive magnet with radial bores

The new 20 MW installation has been running in our laboratory since the end of 1991. In order to fit the new characteristics of the power supplies, we have developed some new solenoids, especially for high homogeneous fields or special configurations with large bores. We describe in detail the new 10 MW, 5 cm room temperature bore, Bitter type magnet with horizontal axis, delivering a continuous field higher than 18 T for a power consumption of 9.5 MW. In the middle plane, 4 cylindrical 5 mm diameter tubes provide optical accesses for laser beam perpendicular to the main field orientation. The results of the tests are presented and the major problems due to the high pressure of the cooling water are discussed. This facility is mainly used for magneto-optical studies such as Cotton-Mouton effect and Faraday effect on complex fluids and heterogeneous solids. The corresponding instrumentation is briefly described.< >