UPGRADING THE CONTROL SYSTEM OF RIKEN RI BEAM FACTORY
FOR NEW INJECTOR
M. Komiyama#, M. Fujimaki, N. Fukunishi, RIKEN Nishina Center, Wako, Saitama, Japan
A. Uchiyama, SHI Accelerator Service, Ltd., Shinagawa, Tokyo, JapanJ. Odagiri, KEK, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, Japan
Abstract
To boost up the intensity of the uranium beam
accelerated in the RIKEN RI Beam Factory (RIBF), a
new 28 GHz superconducting ECR ion source wasconstructed in 2008. The standalone commissioning ofthe ion source has started in early 2009. In order tocontrol the ion source as a part of the RIBF accelerator
complex, we introduced F3RP61-2L as Input/Output
Controller (IOC) and integrated them into the existing
EPICS-based RIBF control system. F3RP61-2L is a new
CPU module running Linux, which functions with the I/O
modules of FA-M3 PLC on the PLC-bus. It is expected tomake our control system simpler and easier to maintain.
We will report the details of the control system of the newion source and its integration into the whole RIBF controlsystem.

OVERVIEW OF RIBF CONTROL SYSTEMThe RIBF has an accelerator complex consisting of one
heavy-ion linac (RILAC) [1] and five heavy-ion
cyclotrons including the world’s first superconducting
ring cyclotron (SRC) [2]. The injector system of the RIBF
includes the RILAC, an AVF cyclotron and the RIKEN
Ring Cyclotron (RRC) which have been used more thantwenty years. Three newly-constructed cyclotrons (fRC,IRC, SRC) were commissioned in 2006 and started abeam service to users in early 2007. Most parts of theRIBF components are controlled using EPICS [3]. Manykinds of controllers are in use to control them, such as
two kinds of our in-house controllers based on CAMAC
and network interface, a control board based on VME andsome kinds of PLCs. They are controlled and monitored
by front-end controllers called IOC through Ethernetconnections. In our system, almost all EPICS
driver/device supports for controllers above mentioned
are executed on Linux-based IOCs. To control the inhouse controller based on CAMAC, we are using thenetwork-based crate controller (CC/NET), which is acommercial product of Toyo Corporation [4] [5]. Since it
is a single board computer based on Linux, we can
execute EPICS base software on it. Therefore, theCC/NET itself is one of IOCs. On the other hand, both thenetwork-based in-house controller (Network-DIM, NDIM) [6] and PLCs don’t have such kind of OS toexecute EPICS base software on themselves. Therefore,
in order to control them in EPICS, they should beconnected with another EPICS IOC through Ethernet____________________________________________#misaki@riken.jp

connections to convert the communication protocols
between EPICS Channel Access and PLCs or the N-DIM.
For the RIBF control, a lot of Linux-based small single
board computers are used as IOCs, and they execute
software called netDev on them. The netDev wasdeveloped by ourselves in collaboration with the KEKcontrol group in 2006 [7]. As an exception, only a type ofcontrol board based on VME is controlled and monitored
by a device/driver support developed based on vxWorks.
As a VME board, we are using NIO board which is acommercial product of Hitachi Zosen Corporation.
The in-house CAMAC based controllers control
approximately 370 magnet power supplies, 100 beamdiagnostic devices and vacuum systems. CAMAC system
is applied to the components in the RRC, AVF cyclotron
and their beam transport lines. On the other hand, the NDIMs control approximately 250 beam diagnostic devices
and vacuum systems. They are mainly applied to thedevices in the three new ring cyclotrons, in their beamtransport lines and around RILAC. Since the RILAC is
the oldest accelerator in the RIBF, a step-by-step upgradeof the old control system is necessary for stable operation.
PLCs control the vacuum systems for cyclotrons andsome beam diagnostic devices. There are many PLCs in
the RIBF, however, EPICS controls and monitors only
about 12 of them. Other PLCs have their own control
systems and they are independent from EPICS system. Atlast, NIO boards control approximately 420 power
supplies for the magnets in the three new ring cyclotrons,in their beam transport lines and around RILAC. Table 1
shows the summary of interface controllers used in theRIBF control system.

ADVANTAGE OF SYSTEM WITH
EMBEDDED EPICS
The RIBF control system has been operated without
serious troubles for these three years and a lot ofconvenient functions have been introduced step by step.
On the other hand, we have evaluated the use of F3RP612L as an IOC which controls various kinds of PLC
modules. F3RP61-2L is a new PLC-CPU module runninga soft real-time Linux produced by Yokogawa Electric
Corporation and installation of EPICS on it has beendeveloped by collaboration between the KEK control
group and us.

Table 1: Interface Controllers Used in the RIBF Control System
RILAC

AVF/RRCIon Source

Hard Wire

WE 7000RF

PLC (CVM1)

PLC(Melsec)/DIM

Magnet Power Supply GP-IB/NIO/DIM
Beam Diagnostics
Motion Controller

BTBTBT(in Nishina bldg. (in RIBF bldg.)

PLC (CS1)

DIM

DIM/NIO

DIM/N-DIM

DIM

DIM/N-DIM

DIM

PLC (FA-M3)/N-DIM/DIM

DIM

N-DIM

PLC (CS1)

DIM/N-DIM

Beam Interlock

Hard wire/PLC (Melsec)

DIM/
PLC(Melsec)

DIM/
PLC(Melsec)

Cooling

Local Control

Local Control

Local Control

VacuumfRC

DIM/NIO

NIO/DIMNIO

N-DIM/DIM

N-DIM

N-DIM

PLC (FA-M3)
PLC (Melsec)/N-DIM/DIM
PLC(FA-M3)

N-DIM

N-DIM
N-DIM

Injection Linefor Big-RIPS

Big-RIPS

NIO

NIO

NIO

N-DIM

N-DIM

PLC(FA-M3)

IRC

SRC

PLC (CS1)PLC (CS1)

NIO
N-DIM

PLC (CS1) PLC (Melsec)/N-DIM/N-DIM
PLC (CS1) PLC (Melsec)

PLC(FA-M3)
N-DIM

PLC(FA-M3)

PLC (Melsec)
Local Control: controlled by existing EPICS system

Local Control

PLC (Melsec)* DIM: in-house controller based on CAMAC: monitored by existing EPICS system

It functions with a sequence CPU, a base module, apower source module, and various I/O modules of theFA-M3, which are the commercial PLC series of
Yokogawa Electric Corporation. It was commerciallyreleased in 2008, and we succeeded in building EPICS
base programs on it in June 2008 [8]. As mentioned in
the last paragraph, PLC has been used in the RIBF
control system before F3RP61-2L is released, and its
control logic was constructed with the ladder program ona sequence CPU. They are controlled from a high-levelapplication such as GUI through Ethernet connection
with IOC. As an advantage of introducing F3RP61-2L tothe control system instead of the stably-operated existing
PLC-CPU is that the control system becomes simple. It
is expected that it becomes easier to fix a trouble when itoccurs because the number of computers are reduced in
the control system. Concretely, F3RP61-2L works as anIOC itself in the EPICS system and it does not require
additional IOC machine to communicate with high-levelapplications. In other words, it becomes possible thatF3RP61-2L as EPICS IOC directly accesses each I/Omodules of PLC through the PLC bus, not through
Ethernet. As a result, there are two advantages: one isthat developing driver/device support becomes very
simple, and the other is that we will not be bothered by
the problem of originating from the network
communication such as delay of receiving messages oran interruption of communication.

CONTROL SYSTEM FOR NEW
INJECTOR OF RIBF
In 2008, the RIBF succeeded in providing heavy ion
beams of 48Ca and 238U with 170 particle-nano-ampare(pnA) and 0.4 pnA, respectively, at an energy of 345
MeV/u. In order to increase the intensity of the uranium
beam, a superconducting ECR [9] ion source and a newlinac injector (RILAC2) [10] are now under construction.
The new ion source is designed to use a microwave
source of 28 GHz. Except for the microwave source of28 GHz, the construction of the ion source wascompleted and installed in upstream position of theexisting RILAC in early 2009. The ion source wasinstalled on a high-voltage terminal, where the beamfrom the source will be directly injected into the RILAC
by skipping the RFQ pre-injector. Commissioning andperformance tests of the ion source have been started inFY2008 using the existing microwave source of 18 GHz
and a newly-constructed medium-energy beam-transport(MEBT) line between the end of the high-voltage
terminal and the RILAC.
Considering the advantages of using F3RP61-2L inthe system, we adopted it for the control system of thenew injection system including the new ion source. It is
the first time for us to install the F3RP61-2L system into
the RIBF control system.
A new control system using F3RP61-2L applied to thenew ion source controls following devices; the power
supplies for the solenoid and hexapole coils, the RFsource, the high-voltage power supply for the extraction
electrode, the controller of gas feeding system, thenegatively biased disk, the high temperature oven forsolid material. In addition, it also monitors the leakage ofwater at the stage of the ion source. The components
installed in MEBT are also controlled by EPICS,
however, they are controlled by the same kind ofcontrollers used in RIBF. Therefore, we applied the samekind of programs as used in the RIBF control system tothem.
Fig. 1 shows the control system for the new ion
source using F3RP61-2L. We need to separate the PLC
unit in two because of the difference of the ground
potential level between them. The negatively biased disk
and the high temperature oven were placed besides of theplasma chamber whose voltage was kept 20 kV higher
than the high-voltage terminal where the ion source itself
was installed. Therefore, we placed a PLC unit with CPU
module and some I/O modules and an optical link
module just beside the ion source, and the other PLC unit
with only some I/O modules and an optical link module
was placed besides the plasma chamber. The
communication between the both units is done throughan optical fiber.

mentioned above, we have another superconducting ECR
ion source. The ions extracted from this ion source are
injected into the AVF cyclotron, which is another injector
to the RRC. The control system for the ion source alsoemploys F3RP61-2L. In this case, some special PLC
modules with various functions on themselves, such as aposition control module and a serial communication
module were installed. However, since basic control
logics are common in both ion sources, basic I/O
modules of FA-M3 are also installed in the system.
Control tests for this ion source continue in order torealize steady operation of both ion sources.

REFERENCES
Figure 1: The control system for the new ion source
using F3RP61-2L.
For the control of the new ion source, we are using
only basic I/O module of PLC such as DI module, DOmodule, AI module and AO module. The control logic
for each component was written in EPICS sequencer
instead of traditional ladder programs as before.
For GUI development, we adopted the edm instead ofthe medm for the first time. Both the edm and the medm
are applications for developing GUI, which aresupported by EPICS collaboration. The advantage ofusing the edm for the control system of the new ion
source is that its build-in XY plot tool is convenient in
illustrating charge-stage distribution produced by the ion
source.

PRESENT STATUS AND PLANEDSCHEDULESince we installed only basic I/O modules in thecontrol system of the new ion source, it was not difficult
to construct the control system. The performance test of
the new ion source started in early 2009 by a local
control and the remote control test of the ion source
started in June, 2009.
In July and September 2009, the acceleration tests
using the 136Xe beams were performed, in which ions
extracted from the new ion source were injected into theRILAC through the MEBT. In these two tests, we foundthat the control system using F3RP61-2L was working
quite stably. In addition, we also found that theperformance in speed and functions was sufficient for thecontrol system of the superconducting ECR ion source.
In October 2009, the first acceleration test using 238U
from the new ion source to RIBF is scheduled. In thistest, a uranium beam generated in the new ion source
will be injected into the RIBF cyclotrons, and the
expected beam intensity extracted from the SRC is 5 pnA.
We are now preparing a lot of EPICS sequencers andmonitor programs for the success of the test.
In addition to the new superconducting ion source[1] M. Odera et al., Nucl. Instr. Meth. A227, p.187(1984).
[2] N. Fukunishi et al., Proc. of 23rd Particle
Accelerator Conference (PAC’09), Vancouver,Canada, May 4-8, 2009.
[3] M. Komiyama et al., Proc. of the 2007 International
Conference on Accelerator and Large Experimental
Physics Control Systems (ICALEPCS2007),Knoxville, Tennessee, USA, Oct. 15-19, 2007.
[4] http://wwwonline.kek.jp/~yasu/Conference/rt2003/
CAMAC/RT2003-CAMAC.pdf.
[5] http://www-online.kek.jp/~yasu/Parallel-CAMAC/.
[6] M. Komiyama et al., Proc. of the 2003 International
Conference on Accelerator and Large Experimental
Physics Control Systems (ICALEPCS2003),
Gyeongju, Korea, Oct. 13-17, 2003.
[7] J. Odagiri et al., Proc. of the 3rd Annual Meetingof Particle Accelerator Society of Japan and the 31st
Linear Accelerator meeting in Japan, Sendai, Aug.
2-4, 2006.
[8] A. Uchiyama et al., Proc. of International Workshop
on Personal Computers and Particle Accelerator
Controls (PCaPAC08), Ljubljana, Slovenia, Oct 2023, 2008.
[9] N. Nakagawa et al., Rev. Sci. Instrum. 79 02A327(2008).
[10] O. Kamigaito et al, Proc. of 11th International
Conference on Heavy Ion Accelerator Technology(HIAT09), Venezia, Italy, Jun. 8-12, 2009.