Efficiency Boost of the Materials Science Diffractometer E3 at BENSC: One Order of Magnitude Due to a Horizontally and Vertically Focusing Monochromator

Abstract

The recent performance boost of E3, the residual strain and texture diffractometer at the HMI, Berlin, has enhanced significantly the experimental turnover as well as the quality of the measurement results. The instrument was equipped with a new vertically focusing and horizontally bent perfect Si single crystal monochromator (Figure 1), which optimizes the figure of merit (Figure 2) for residual stress experiments. The increase in the figure of merit compared to the previous monochromator is more than a factor of 10.

Acknowledgments

The work has been partly supported by the Grant Agency of the Czech Republic (project no. 202/06/0601). Also the support and assistance of BENSC is gratefully acknowledged. The authors would like to thank Imperial College London, i.e., Professor Kamran Nikbin, Dr. Catrin Davies, and Professor Noel O'Dowd (who is now at the University of Limerick) for the use of the specimens used in the comparisons.