The article is devoted to the study of losses in devices based on high-temperature superconductors of the 2nd generation. The complexity of the devices under study increases from a single rack coil to a winding assembled from several coils, and finally to an electric machine operating in generator mode. This is the way to experimentally study the behavior of 2nd generation high temperature superconductor (2G HTS) carrying a transport current in various conditions: self-field, external DC, and AC magnetic field. Attention is also paid to the losses in the winding during its operation from the inverter, which simulates the operating conditions in the motor mode of a propulsion system.