Improving Superconductor Levitation for Seismic Isolation Device by Applying Eddy Current Effect

Pinning force is the mechanism between a superconductor and a permanent magnet and it provides a stable levitation. However, when external force greater than the pinning force such as the earthquake exerts, the levitated object may lose the levitating characteristic. In order to achieve more stabilized levitation, the copper plate was inserted in between a superconductor and permanent magnets. And by applying the eddy current effect caused from the relationship between a copper plate and permanent magnets, more stabilized levitation can be established. In this study, an optimized design was found based on various configurations of permanent magnet's polarity, thickness and area of copper plate, and the gap distance between copper plate and permanent magnet. As results, higher eddy current value was obtained at where the change of polarity exists in permanent magnet configuration, and the highest eddy current value was observed at the copper plate thickness of 5 mm and the area of 80 mm ${\times}$ 80 mm. From the resulted optimized conditions above, which are 7 mm gap distance between a superconductor and permanent magnets and 80 mm ${\times}$ 80 mm ${\times}$ 5 mm dimension of a copper plate, the stiffness value was 65 % increased comparing to without any copper plate insertion.

와상전류를 응용하여 지진 충격흡수 장치를 위한 초전도 자기부상 안정화 향상