Construction and Performance of HTS Maglev Launch Assist Test Vehicle

Abstract

Various Maglev launch assist concepts were proposed in the world for the aim to find low-cost, safe, and reliable ways to get to space. Among them, high temperature superconducting (HTS) bulk magnetic levitation platform was considered as a better one for Maglev launch assist because of its inherent stability both in the vertical and lateral directions. As a primary work, a demo HTS Maglev launch assist test vehicle was designed and constructed in our laboratory. The system includes a vehicle body, permanent magnet guideway with the length of 7 m, the acceleration and braking parts. HTS bulks were located in LN 2 vessels fixed below the vehicle body. The levitation force larger than 50 kg was provided by the interaction between HTS bulks and NdFeB guideway. The HTS bulk arrangement was optimized by measuring and comparing static and dynamic levitating characteristics of different HTS bulk units on NdFeB guideway. The acceleration part of the system was achieved by the linear motor. The braking was achieved by a set of spring buffer. The experimental investigation was carried out by the system, and some results were presented in the paper.Index Terms-High-temperature superconductors, launch systems, magnetic launch assist, magnetic levitation.

Magnetic Levitation

“…Electromagnetic propulsion has been developed to help launch airplanes from sea-based carriers. In several Chinese research laboratories, the use of bulk HTS carried in vehicles levitated over a permanent magnet track has been investigated for train transport and maglev-assist launch (66)(67)(68)(69)(70). The use of maglev-assist launch has several synergies with the reusable launch vehicle, with weight savings that cascade through the design.…”

Investigation on Dynamic Response Properties of High-Tc Superconducting System: Application for the Maglev Test Vehicle

“…, the distributed shield current is divided into a number of concentric circular line currents and the levitation force at a step time was expressed as: (1) where and are the radius and thickness of the HTS, the magnetic flux densities in the radial direction in a space generated by the PM guideway. 1051-8223/$25.00 © 2008 IEEE At the FC conditions, the HTS exhibits a combination of flux pinning (frozen dipole) and diamagnetic (mirror dipole) properties, according the micro-view of HTS, the fluxions are trapped in the pinning potential barrier and the induced current density is produced in the HTS, , which is inverse with the external current density , so the shielding current density vector .…”

“…I N THE concept research on the magnetic launch assistance [1], the design of superconducting suspension system is one of the critical technologies for the high speed propulsion system, and the most important issues in the levitation applications is the stability of the spinning HTS over the PM guideway and the high suspension force. As for the system mentions above, field cooled (FC) conditions is one of the critical factors to maintain an optimal proportion between the levitation force and guidance force.…”

A High-Temperature Superconducting Maglev Ring Test Line Developed in Chengdu, China

“…One is the ultra-thin cryostat bottom with a thickness of only 2 mm; the other is the long superconducting operation time over 24 hours' operation with no liquid nitrogen refilling and only 2 watt thermal loss detected. Moreover, many valuable works have been reported [5] [6] [7] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] .…”