The CLEO III drift chamber

The CLEO group at the Cornell Electron Storage Ring has constructed and commissioned a new central drift chamber. With 9796 cells arranged in 47 layers ranging in radius from 13.2 to 79cm, the new drift chamber has a smaller outer radius and fewer wires than the drift chamber it replaces, but allows the CLEO tracking system to have improved momentum resolution. Reduced scattering material in the chamber gas and in the inner skin separating the drift chamber from the silicon vertex detector provides a reduction of the multiple scattering component of the momentum resolution and an extension of the usable measurement length into the silicon. Momentum resolution is further improved through quality control in wire positioning and symmetry of the electric fields in the drift cells which have provided a reduction in the spatial resolution to 88μm (averaged over the full drift range).