Wisniewski, E.E. Antipov, S.P. Conde, M.E. Doran, D.S. Gai, W. Jing, C.-J. Liu, W. Power, J.G. Qiu, J.Q. Whiteford, C. JACoW Geneva, Switzerland 978-3-95450-180-9 10.18429/JACoW-NAPAC2016-WEPOB19 English 934-936 WEPOB19 cathode ion gun operation wakefield Contribution to a conference proceedings 2017 2017-01 http://dx.doi.org/10.18429/JACoW-NAPAC2016-WEPOB19 https://jacow.org/napac2016/papers/wepob19.pdf The AWA L-band, high-charge photoinjector for the 70 MeV drive beamline has been operating for almost 3 years at the Argonne Wakefield Accelerator (AWA) facility. at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL). The gun operates at high-field (85 MV/m peak field on the cathode) and has a high quantum efficiency (QE) Cesium telluride photocathode with a large area (30 mm diameter). It produces high-charge, short pulse, single bunches (Q > 100 nC) as well as long bunch-trains (Q > 600 nC) for wakefield experiments (high peak current). During the first two years of operation, photocathode performance was evaluated and areas of improvement were identified. After study, consideration and consultation, steps were taken to improve the performance of the photocathode. So far, in total, three photocathodes have been fabricated on-site, installed and operated in the gun. Improvements made to the photocathode plug, vacuum system, and gun operation are detailed. The results include vastly improved conditioning times, better cathode performance, and QE above 4% for over 11 months.