Design, assembly and beam validation of a full-scale TORCH module

The TORCH time-of-flight detector is part of a proposed upgrade of the LHCb experiment, foreseen for the high-luminosity phase of the LHC. The TORCH detector provides particle identification of hadrons in the sub-10 GeV/c momentum range, exploiting the prompt production of Cherenkov photons in an array of fused-silica plates. Photons are propagated to the periphery of the detector via total internal reflection, where they are focused by a cylindrical mirror onto an array of fast-timing MCP-PMT photon detectors. In order to achieve the design goals of TORCH, individual photons must be timed to 70 ps precision or better. The development of the MCP-PMTs, the mechanical design and assembly strategy of a full-scale TORCH detector module, plus its system-level validation in a test beam are described. A validation of timing references, the optical integrity across glue joints and the readout integration are presented.