Influence of tape-specific properties on local stress and strain in Bi-2223/Ag tapes

Superconductors are typically fragile, and their superconducting properties are reduced under strain. Moreover, superconductor wires operate under large mechanical loads in most applications. Thus, a careful mechanical analysis is essential when designing superconducting applications. So far, plenty of experimental and computational studies concerning stress and strain in, e.g. Bi-2223/Ag tapes have been carried out. However, Bi-2223 tapes contain several properties that vary between different tapes and are often unknown when designing a specific application. The largest uncertainties are related to the creep at high temperatures, stiffness and anisotropy of filaments and the yield strength of silver. In this paper, the influence of uncertainties on the local stress and strain in Bi-2223/Ag tapes is studied computationally to determine efficient strategies to reduce inaccuracy of the results. The results suggest that the filaments can be described as an isotropic material and the filament stiffness is the most important input parameter to estimate the total stiffness of the tape.