http://www.cato.org/pubs/briefs/bp-016.html Super Boondoggle Time To Pull The
Plug
On The Superconducting Super
Collider
May 26, 1992
Technological Defects
Despite its supporters' claims to the contrary, the SSC will rely on several untested technologies that are proving to be extremely expensive and riddled with problems. Some of the obstacles that the SSC has run into were predicted by its opponents. The gigantic atom-smashing machine will not be built with off-the-shelf technologies because neither the individual pieces nor any comparable systems have been built before.
The SSC has been designed to the scientifically optimum limits of a circular collider configuration. The size of the loop around which the atoms will circle was changed when researchers determined that there was a slightly different optimum size than originally assumed. There is even new evidence suggesting that a circular configuration may not be necessary for exploring high-energy particle collisions. Improved linear designs, which are potentially much less expensive than the SSC, may be technologically feasible in only a few years. Far less expensive linear design electron-positron accelerators soon may be able to compete with the SSC design as a scientific tool.(37)
In addition, only 11 prototypes of the more than 8,600 dipole magnets and only 1 prototype of the 2,000 quadrupole magnets have been built and tested. In fact, even if the prototypes are successful, most of the magnets will not be tested until after they are installed in the underground tunnel. The recent experience with the out-of-focus Hubble space telescope should provide a lesson on the desirability of pretesting complex equipment.
In addition, the subatomic particle collisions must be detected by complex devices and interpreted by powerful computers if the experiments are to yield any information whatsoever--yet the budget for that vital feature of the project has not been approved. The Department of Energy's estimated budget for the SSC includes no more than $640 million for design and construction of the massive detectors.(38) The people working on the designs "have been instructed to plan on a budget of no more than $500 million each, only half of which will come from the U.S. government."(39) So far, only one design has been accepted (but not built) by the SSC project managers, although the SSC plan requires two separate detector designs. The accepted design was to have been peer reviewed in April 1992. The estimated cost of the first detector alone is $712 million.
Even bigger roadblocks have impeded the development of the SSC's second detector. Selection of a designer of the detectors necessary to measure and record the experimental results has been slow and painful. The L-Star detector project proposal, developed by an international consortium of European, Soviet, and American institutions (90 institutions in 13 countries) has been rejected by the SSC management team. In January 1991 the SSC management team rejected a second design known as EMPACT/TEXAS. A June 1991 workshop was organized to investigate design options and create a new consortium. Currently, the gamma-electron-moon detector proposal is scheduled for review in November 1992.
The detector design problems demonstrate that the SSC is much further from reality than its proponents claim. In addition, the decision to develop only two detectors was based on cost, not scientific, considerations. Regardless of funding levels, the lack of appropriate detection devices and workable computer software could limit the SSC's scientific usefulness and greatly delay the scheduling of experiments.
That article totally contradicts what you said about the magnets. You said they were obsolete; the article says they were too far beyond the envelope. They couldn't have been both.