Roles of superconducting magnetic bearings and active magnetic bearings

in attitude control and energy storage ywheel

Jiqiang Tang
a,b,
, Jiancheng Fang
a
, Shuzhi Sam Ge
b
a
School of Instrument Science and Opto-Electronics Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China
b
Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, National University of Singapore, Singapore 117576, Singapore
a r t i c l e i n f o
Article history:
Received 20 April 2012
Received in revised form 10 July 2012
Accepted 12 July 2012
Available online 23 July 2012
Keywords:
Superconducting magnetic bearing (SMB)
Active magnetic bearing (AMB)
Field cooling
Gyroscopic effect
Attitude control and energy storage
ywheel (ACESF)
a b s t r a c t
Compared with conventional energy storage ywheel, the rotor of attitude control and energy storage y-
wheel (ACESF) used in space not only has high speed, but also is required to have precise and stable direc-
tion. For the presented superconducting magnetic bearing (SMB) and active magnetic bearing (AMB)
suspended ACESF, the rotor model including gyroscopic couples is established originally by taking the
properties of SMB and AMB into account, the forces of SMB and AMB are simplied by linearization
within their own neighbors of equilibrium points. For the high-speed rigid discal rotor with large inertia,
the negative effect of gyroscopic effect of rotor is prominent, the radial translation and tilting movement
of rotor suspended by only SMB, SMB with equivalent PMB, or SMB together with PD controlled AMB are
researched individually. These analysis results proved originally that SMB together with AMB can make
the rotor be stable and make the radial amplitude of the vibration of rotor be small while the translation
of rotor suspended by only SMB or SMB and PM is not stable and the amplitude of this vibration is large.
For the stability of the high-speed rotor in superconducting ACESF, the AMB can suppress the nutation
and precession of rotor effectively by cross-feedback control based on the separated PD type control or
by other modern control methods.
2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
Having a very high energy density, ywheels could be used as
one single energy storage and attitude control device, forming a
combined energy and attitude control system. This combination
could lead to different improvements on mission design, e.g. mass
saving, performance enhancement, reliability increase and so on
[1,2]. Looking at the performance, the combined energy and atti-
tude control system is much more promising than the traditional
system (batteries with reaction wheels) [35]. Energy storage y-
wheel can have energy fed in the rotational mass of a ywheel,
store it as kinetic energy, and release out upon demand [68].
But for the attitude control and energy storage ywheel (ACESF),
not only the speed of the rotor is high, but also the position of
the rotor must be controlled accurately to ensure that the vector
of angular momentum have precise and stable direction, so the
vibration of the high-speed rotor must be as little as possible to
avoid disturbing the stability of spacecraft. Active magnetic bear-
ings (AMBs) can accommodate very high spin speeds and have the-
oretically unlimited imbalance induced vibrations. Recently, the
frictional coefcients of high temperature superconducting mag-
netic bearings (SMBs) has achieved in the order of 10
6
or even
smaller, what could contribute signicantly to lower loss in energy
storage ywheel and more precise in attitude control for space
application [7].
Low stiffness of SMB is one major problem for industrial scale
ywheel system. Mostly, a hybrid support of a ywheel rotor using
conventional AMB together with SMB seems to provide a solution
to this problem [911]. The SMB is used either to bear the weight
of rotor or to stabilize the rotor by the auto-stability of the high
temperature superconductor, but the relationship of magnetic
suspension force or stiffness between the SMBs and AMBs and
the behaviors of radial translation and tilting movement of the
high-speed rotor suspended by SMB or SMB and AMB are still
unclear yet.
Fig. 1 is a prototype superconducting ACESF incorporating SMB
and AMB we constructed to investigate the roles of SMB and AMB.
The rotor suspension system consists of an axial high tempera-
ture superconducting magnetic bearing (HTSMB) at the lower end
of the hollow composite ber rotor, one axial AMB at the upper end
of the rotor and two radial AMBs in the middle. The stators of the
axial AMB and the axial HTSMB are mounted on the upper side and
lower side of the vacuum enclosure, respectively. In this paper, all
AMB are permanent magnet biased hybrid magnetic bearings.
The axial AMB does most to reduce the load of rotor over axial
0921-4534/$ - see front matter 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.physc.2012.07.007

Corresponding author at: School of Instrument Science and Opto-Electronics

Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China. Tel.: +86 01082317396;
fax: +86 01082316813.
E-mail address: tjq_72@163.com (J. Tang).
Physica C 483 (2012) 178185
Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect
Physica C
j our nal homepage: www. el sevi er . com/ l ocat e/ physc
HTSMB and to control the axial translation of the hollow composite
ber rotor. The HTSMB, which is one alternative to axial MB, is en-
tirely passive and used to support the rotor weight partially and to
stabilize the rotor by the self-stability of high temperature super-
conductor. The displacements and tilting angles of rotor are mea-
sured by two position sensors (A and B), which are integrated
axial/radial eddy current sensors. Radial AMBs including upper ra-
dial AMB (radial AMB-Up) and lower radial AMB (radial AMB-Lo)
are used to control the radial movement and tilting of rotor. The
stators of the radial AMBs and the motor/generator are xed on a
titanic shaft, which is mounted on the vacuum enclosure by bolts.
Four touchdown bearings as auxiliary equipments are used to sup-
port the rotor when the magnetic bearings are turned off or fail.
The axial protective gap is 1.5 mm and the radial protective gap
is 0.12 mm. The rotor is driven by a DC motor. In order to reduce
the aerodynamic drag and to avoid the frost of air within the gap
of the HTSMB, the whole system is enclosed by a vacuum enclosure
with pressure of about 15 Pa. With such a rotor suspension sys-
tem, the rotor can be levitated stably and rotate at a very high
speed.
Based on the presented superconducting ACESF, this paper will
research the relationship between SMB and AMB theoretically and
originally for the purpose of attitude control and energy storage. By
constructing the rotor model and force linearization of SMB and
AMB respectively, the radial translation and tilting movement of
rotor suspended by only SMB, SMB with equivalent PMB, SMB
and AMB with PD control type are researched. These analysis re-
sults will give us some helpful hints to research the superconduc-
ting ACESF.
2. Flywheel rotor model
Because the magnetic suspension force is attractive, we use
F
upxp
and F
upyp
to present the x component and y component
of force in the positive direction for the upper magnetic bearing
respectively, F
upxn
and F
upyn
present the x component and y com-
ponent of force in the negative direction for the upper AMB. Simi-
larly, F
loxp
and F
loyp
present the corresponding force for lower
AMB. F
loxn
and F
loyn
are used to present the x component and y
component of force in the negative direction for the lower AMB.
F
A-AMB
presents the magnetic suspension force of axial AMB in
the positive direction of z axle. Due to the pinning effect, a lateral
restoring force occurs in the radial direction. On the other hand, the
superconducting magnetic suspension force may be attractive or
repulsive, so we use F
supx
, F
supy
and F
supz
to present the x compo-
nent, y component and z component of it for the SMB. Taking the
effects of motor into account, the x component, y component and
z component of force of motor acting on rotor is presented by F
motx
,
F
moty
and F
motz
, respectively. T
mot
presents the driving moment of
motor, and T the load moment on rotor. When the rotor rotates
at a constant speed of X, the rotor system for the superconducting
ACESF can be depicted as shown in Fig. 2.
On the assumption that the axial and radial directions are sep-
arated and the dynamics of the rotor may be investigated indepen-
dently, a complete ywheel rotor model including gyroscopic
couples has been derived to analyze the relationship between
SMB and AMB based on the motion equation of rotor derived
according to the movement of the rotors center of mass.
mx
c
F
upx
F
lox
F
supx
F
motx
m y
c
F
upy
F
loy
F
supy
F
moty
J

w J
z
X _ u F
loy
L
lo
F
supy
L
sup
F
upy
L
up
F
moty
L
mot
J u J
z
X
_
w F
upx
L
up
F
lox
L
lo
F
supx
L
sup
1
Axial AMB
Radial
AMB-Up
Motor/
Generator
Radial
AMB-Lo
Axial
HTSMB
Housing
Multi-ring
Carbon fiber rotor
Shaft
Sensors B
Sensors A
Fig. 1. Sketch of superconducting ACESF.
Fig. 2. Flywheel rotor model for the superconducting ACESF.
J. Tang et al. / Physica C 483 (2012) 178185 179
where w and u are the tilt angle around x axle and y axle, respec-
tively, x
c
and y
c
are the displacements of rotors center of mass.
F
upx
= F
upxp
F
upxn
, F
lox
= F
loxp
F
loxn
, F
upy
= F
upyp
F
upyn
,
and F
loy
= F
loyp
F
loyn
. J is the transversal inertia moment of the
rigid rotor around its x axle or its y axle, and J
z
is the polar inertia
moment of rotor around its z axle. L
lo
is the distance between the
center of rotor and the center of lower magnetic bearing, L
sup
the
distance between the center of rotor and the center of SMB, L
up
the distance between the center of rotor and the center of upper
AMB, L
mot
the distance between the center of rotor and the center
of motor.
In practice, we make the center of motor to coincide with the
center of the rotor to ensure L
mot
= 0, the force F
motx
, F
moty
and F
motz
of the motor are considered individually, so (1) become
mx
c
F
upx
F
lox
F
supx
m y
c
F
upy
F
loy
F
supy
J

w J
z
X _ u F
loy
L
lo
F
supy
L
sup
F
upy
L
up
J u J
z
X
_
w F
upx
L
up
F
lox
L
lo
F
supx
L
sup
2
3. Axial superconducting magnetic bearings
The HTS YBaCuO has the properties of ux exclusion and ux
pinning when it is cooled by liquid nitrogen. Based on the repul-
sion and restoration between superconducting bulks and perma-
nent magnets, the HTS can be applied to construct SMB which
can provide an auto-stable repulsion force in the axial direction
and restoring forces in the radial directions. The magnetic forces
of SMB in every direction can be approximately described as
follows:
Fi
Z Z Z
l
0
MH
dH
di
dV l
0
MH
dH
di
V 3
where M(H) is the magnetization of the superconducting block, H
magnetic eld vector, V the volume of superconductor, and
i = x, y, z, where x and y presents the radial degrees and z presents
the axial degrees, respectively.
SMB has zero eld cooling (ZFC) type and eld cooling (FC) type
with respect to the HTS cooling mode. ZFC bearings produce a large
levitation force but are unstable in all directions, hence the addi-
tional stable control is required. FC bearings produce less level of
levitation force, but they provide passive stability in all directions.
With respect to a rotor passively supported by the SMB without
any control mechanisms for ywheel energy storage, Mochimitsu
Komori and Taku Hamasaki [12], Mochimitsu Komori [8, 9, 12,
13] found that the stiffness and the damping coefcient of the
SMB system can be controlled. Rastogi and Alonso [10] studied
the effects of superconductors thickness, diameter, and cooling
height on the super-conducting magnetic suspension properties
and pointed out that the maximal force is 44.3 N when the super-
conductor with 15 mm thickness and 6 mm cooling gap, the max-
imal force is 64.7 N when the superconductor with 15 mm
thickness and 5 mm cooling gap.
In the superconducting ACESF, the axial SMB consists of
superconductors arranged as Fig. 3 shown. For permanent magnet
NdFe-30, B
r
is 1.1 T, H
c
is 8.424 10
5
A/m, the diameter of the
melt-processed YBaCuO bulk superconductors is 28.5 mm and
Container
LN
2
HTS
b Discal ulk
2
LN
insulator
Thermal
(a) (b) (c)
Fig. 3. Arrangements of superconductors for SMB and superconducting suspension force measurement apparatus. (a) Schematic diagram of the arrangement of
superconductors. (b) Six ring-shaped superconductors. (c) Suspension force measurement apparatus.
Fig. 5. Schematic diagram and its conguration of radial AMB. (a) Sectional view. (b) End view. (c) Conguration.
0 5 10 15 20 25
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
S
u
s
p
e
n
s
i
o
n

f
o
r
c
e

(
N
)
Distance (mm)
Fig. 4. Static axial magnetic force of SMB with 5 mm cooling gap.
180 J. Tang et al. / Physica C 483 (2012) 178185
the thickness of them is 17 mm, six same YBaCuO bulk supercon-
ductors are arranged in a circle ring.
Before the rotor suspension system begins to work, the vacuum
enclosure is vacuumized. When the axial AMB is not powered and
-0.1
-0.05
0
0.05
0.1
-0.1
-0.05
0
0.05
0.1
0
20
40
60
80
100
Displacement (mm) Displacement (mm)
F
o
r
c
e

(
N
)
-0.1
-0.05
0
0.05
0.1
-0.1
-0.05
0
0.05
0.1
0.8
0.9
1
1.1
1.2
1.3
1.4
x 10
6
Displacement (mm) Displacement (mm)
D
i
s
p
l
a
n
c
e
m
e
n
t

S
t
i
f
f

(
N
/
m
)
(a)
(b)
Fig. 6. Simulative results of relationship among radial suspension force, displacement stiffness and displacement of radial AMB. (a) Relationship between radial suspension
force and displacement. (b) Relationship between displacement stiffness and displacement.
-1
-0.5
0
0.5
1
-1
-0.5
0
0.5
1
0
50
100
150
200
250
Current (A) Current (A)
F
o
r
c
e

(
N
)
-1
-0.5
0
0.5
1
-1
-0.5
0
0.5
1
236.8643
236.8643
236.8643
236.8643
236.8643
236.8643
Current (A) Current (A)
C
u
r
r
e
n
t

S
t
i
f
f

(
N
/
A
)
(a) (b)
Fig. 7. Simulative results of relationship among radial suspension force, displacement stiffness and current of radial AMB. (a) Relationship between radial suspension force
and current. (b) Relationship between current stiffness and current.
(a)
(b)
Fig. 8. Experimental results of relationship among stiffness, displacement and current. (a) Relationship between displacement stiffness and displacement. (b) Relationship
between current stiffness and displacement.
J. Tang et al. / Physica C 483 (2012) 178185 181
the liquid nitrogen is not inputted into the cryogenic cooling sys-
tem, the rotor is supported by the upper touchdown bearings,
the minimum distance between superconductors and permanents
is 4 mm. When the axial AMB is powered, the rotor is lifted up-
wards until it is oriented by the lower touchdown bearings, then
the achieved maximum distance between the permanent magnets
and superconductors, namely the cooling height, is 5.5 mm. At this
moment, the liquid nitrogen is inputted and the HTSMB is eld
cooled. When the bulk superconductors are frozen absolutely, the
power supplied to the axial AMB can be reduced gradually and
the distance between the permanent magnets and superconduc-
tors reduces consequently. The designed maximum reduction is
1 mm and the operation cooling height is at least 4.25 mm.
When the rotor rotates, the rotation speed degradation and the
rotation power loss of the SMB were caused mainly by the braking
magnetic force between the inhomogeneous magnetic eld of the
YBCO bulks and the induced eddy current in the PM rotor [16],
but the HTS losses are fairly small to be neglected in this paper.
When the operation cooling height changes due to the ux creep
and ux ow, relaxation, losses and so on for SMB, the integrated
axial/radial eddy current sensors can measure this change and
the axial AMB then adjust it automatically to make the rotor be
levitated stably. The static axial magnetic force of SMB in FC condi-
tion with 5 mm cooling gap is shown in Fig. 4.
It is clear that there is hysteresis in the curves, but when the PM
is moved away and back again by a small displacement, the minor
force loop is reversible and it can be assumed that variations of
magnetic forces are linear for small displacements [14,15]. The
experimental results have indicated that the average axial stiffness
of SMB is about 12 N/mm within the neighborhood of 5 mm gap
while it increases to about 23 N/mm within the neighborhood of
4 mm gap. If the cooling gap of the axial SMB is given 5.25 mm
and stable working position of rotor is 4.25 mm by decreasing
the rotor downwards 1 mm, then the axial magnetic suspension
force within the neighborhood of 4.25 mm can been simplied as
average axial stiffness k
supz
multiplying the drift d
a
of rotor (mm)
F
supz
k
supz
d
a
4
For the presented SMB, k
supz
is 23 N/mm.
In general, the radial stiffness k
supr
is nearly about one thirds of
axial stiffness, that is to say the radial stiffness k
supr
is about
7.6 N/mm when the gap is 4 mm.
4. Active magnetic bearings
With the capability of high rotational speeds and good accuracy,
AMB are applied in rotating machinery. In an AMB system, every
degree of the rotor is controlled by electromagnets. The electro-
magnets at opposite sides attract the rotor, and the total force act-
ing on the rotor is the sum of the forces of the electromagnets.
Because the interaction between ferromagnetic rotor and electro-
magnets is unstable, the position of the rotor must be measured
by sensors, and the current in the coils is controlled to maintain
this suspension. Although the AMB is a nonlinear actuator, the
actuator will be approximately linear when the nonlinear cur-
rent-force dependence is linearized by the biased permanent
magnets or by supplying a bias current into both coils at opposite
sides of the rotor.
Table 1
Parameters for the ACESF.
Symbol Quantity Designed values
X Speed of rotor 5233.33 rad/s
J Equatorial inertia moment of rotor 0.19995 kg m
2
J
z
Polar inertia moment of rotor 0.291762 kg m
2
m Mass of rotor 27.66 kg
k
supz
Axial stiffness of SMB 23 kN/m
k
supr
Radial stiffness of SMB 7.5 kN/m
k
R-AMBd
Displacement stiffness of radial AMB 630 kN/m
k
R-AMBc
Current stiffness of radial AMB 220 N/A
k
A-AMBd
Displacement stiffness of axial AMB 250580 kN/m
k
A-AMBc
Current stiffness of axial AMB 520 N/A
L
up
/L
lo
Distance between the center of rotor
and the center of upper/lower AMB
0.048 m
L
sup
Distance between the center of rotor
and the center of SMB
0.0945 m
k
s
Sensitivity of position sensor 0.075 V/um
k
p
Proportional coefcient of the control circuit 6.03
k
d
Differential coefcient of the control circuit 0.6621
0 2 4 6 8 10 12
-0.5
0
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
x 10
-4
Step Response
(a)
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1
0
5
10
15
20
x 10
-7
Step Response
(b)
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1
0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
1.2
1.4
1.6
x 10
-6 Step Response
A
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

(
m
)

Time (s)
(c)
A
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

(
m
)

A
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

(
m
)

Time (s)
Time (s)
Fig. 9. Simulation results of radial translation of rotor suspended by different
methods. (a) With SMB only. (b) SMB with PMB. (c) SMB with AMB.
182 J. Tang et al. / Physica C 483 (2012) 178185
In this ACESF, there are two radial AMB: upper AMB and lower
AMB. The radial AMB shown in Fig. 5 consists of installing sleeve,
static laminated magnetic conductor with magnetic pole, static
ux sleeve, permanent magnet, inductance coil, rotational lami-
nated magnetic conductor and rotational ux sleeve. Between
the static laminated magnetic conductor and the rotational lami-
nated magnetic conductor, the magnetic working gap is formed.
Because the radial AMB is permanent magnet biased hybrid mag-
netic bearings, the function of AMB is equivalent to the function
of permanent magnetic bearing (PMB) plus the function of pure ac-
tive magnetic bearing when a control current is supplied to it. If the
control current is turned off, the function of AMB is equivalent to
the function of PMB.
Because the radial magnetic bearing is permanent magnetic
biased style, the magnetic suspension force enlarges with the
reducing of displacement, so the rotor in the balanced position
tends to be unstable. In order to investigate suspension character-
istics of the radial AMB, the simulative results of relationship
among radial suspension force, displacement stiffness and dis-
placement are depicted in Fig. 6. We can see from Fig. 6 that the
displacement of the radial AMB is close related with its position
and the displacement stiffness of radial AMB will increase greatly
when the rotor is drifted to one of its magnetic poles. On the other
hand, the displacement stiffness of radial AMB will be constant
when the rotor is in the center of the AMB. At the same time, the
simulative results of relationship among radial suspension force,
displacement stiffness and current of radial AMB are depicted in
Fig. 7. We can see from Fig. 7 that the suspension force of radial
AMB changes proportionally with current while its current stiff-
ness is constant and does not change with the variety of current
when the rotor is in the center of the radial AMB.
The suspension force F
R-AMB
of radial AMB in x direction or y
direction is characterized clearly by displacement stiffness k
R-
AMBd
and current stiffness k
R-AMBc
at its balanced position.
F
RAMB
k
RAMBd
d
r
k
RAMBc
i
r
5
where d
r
is the radial drift of rotor, d
r
is x
c
in x direction and d
r
is y
c
in y direction. i
r
is the control current in the inductance coils of
radial AMB, and the subscript r represents x or y respectively.
For examples, when the radial AMB is inputted 0 A, 0.1 A and
0.1 A respectively, the experimental results of relationship
between displacement stiffness and displacement are depicted in
Fig. 8a and relationship between current stiffness and displace-
ment are depicted in Fig. 8b when rotor is in the center, drifted up-
ward 0.05 mmor downwards 0.05 mm. From Fig. 8, we proved that
the displacement of the radial AMB is close related with its
position and it be constant when the rotor is in the center of the
AMB, we also proved that the current stiffness is constant and does
not change with the variety of current when the rotor is in the cen-
ter of the radial AMB. When the rotor drifts, the current stiffness
will change with its current proportionally. So the suspension force
of radial AMB described by (5) is reasonable and feasible when the
rotor is in its balanced position. The tested displacement stiffness
k
R-AMBd
is 0.63 N/um and the tested current stiffness k
R-AMBc
is 220 N/A at the balanced position.
5. Simulation and experimental results
For the ACESF, the radial AMB-Up and radial AMB-Lo have same
conguration parameters and are used to control the rotors radial
movement and tilting. The displacement stiffness, current stiffness
of radial AMB-Up is same as that of the radial AMB-Lo, respectively.
The displacement stiffness, current stiffness in x direction is same
as that in y direction for radial AMB-Up or AMB-Lo, respectively.
And L
lo
= L
up
= L.
According to (4) and (5), we can obtain the equations of radial
translation of rotor based on (2)
x
c
2k
RAMBd
k
supr
x
c
2k
RAMBc
i
x
=m
y
c
2k
RAMBd
k
supr
y
c
2k
RAMBc
i
y
=m
6
And the equations of tilting movement of rotor are
J

w J
z
X _ u L
sup
k
supr
y
c
2L k
RAMBc
i
y
J u J
z
X
_
w L
sup
k
supr
x
c
2L k
RAMBc
i
x
7
If AMBs have PD control type, then the control current i
r
has the
forms of k
p
d
r
+ k
d
dd
r
/dt.
5.1. Behavior of radial translation of rotor
Generally, the rotor is well balanced, but the residual unbalance
of rotor is unavoidable. For given 5 mg of unbalance mass, the
unbalanced force acting on the rotor will exceed 1 N when the
rotor rotates at a speed of 50,000 rpm. With these parameters
Fig. 10. Block diagram of tilting movement of rotor.
x (mm)
0 0.05 0.1 0.15 0.2
0
-0.05 -0.1 -0.15
-0.2
y

(
m
m
)

-0.15
-0.05
0.05
0.1
0.1
0.15
0.2
x (mm)
0 0.05 0.1
0
-0.05 -0.1
-0.08
y

(
m
m
)

-0.06
-0.02
-0.04
0.08
0.06
0.04
0.02
-0.1
0.1
(a) (b)
Fig. 11. Simulative traces of whirling of rotor (a) precession (b) nutation.
J. Tang et al. / Physica C 483 (2012) 178185 183
listed in Table 1, the step responses of rotor suspended by only
SMB, SMB with equivalent PMB or SMB with AMB are shown in
Fig. 9 when the given external step disturbance is 1 N.
We can nd that the drift of rotor suspended by only SMB will
not become zero since there is no damping in the modeled system
and its amplitude is up to 0.27 mm, which exceeds the protective
gap of the touchdown bearings and the rotor is unstable. Even if
the protective gap of the touchdown bearings can be enlarged to
avoid this collision, but the error of angular momentum of rotor
is up to 31.8 N m s and will produce a large disturbance on the
spacecraft when the rotor rotates at the speed of 50,000 rpm.
When the AMB is not powered, the AMB is equivalent to a PMB,
then the rotor suspended equivalently by SMB and PMB, the rotor
is still unstable even though the amplitude of vibration has
decreased enormously due to the larger stiffness caused by PM in
AMB. When the rotor is suspended by SMB and AMB with PD con-
trol type, the damping is introduced into the modeled system, the
rotor becomes stable and its amplitude is small due to the larger
stiffness and the introduced damping of the AMB.
5.2. Behavior of tilting movement of rotor
Set M
x
and M
y
as the moments acting on the rotor around x axis
or y axis, respectively, we can draw the block diagram of the tilting
movement of rotor suspended by AMB and SMB as shown in Fig. 10
based on (7) and its Laplace transform.
Both Fig. 11 and (7) indicate that the tilting movement of rotor
around x axis couples that around y axis through the angular
momentum J
z
X, which indicates the gyroscopic effect of high-
speed rotor. The moment around only x axis or y axis can make
the rotor tilting around both x axis and y axis. For a slim rotor,
the gyroscopic effect is slight, but for a discal rotor with large iner-
tia, the gyroscopic effect is enormous. Based on the parameters of
ACESF listed in Table 1, the simulative traces of the whirling of
rotor are shown in Fig. 11, and their frequencies are shown in
Fig. 12 when J
z
/J = 1.459, X= 50,000 rpm and the angular stiffness
of the rotor suspension system is 12,000 N m/rad. From Fig. 11, we
can nd that the simulative maximum amplitude of the nutation of
rotor is about 0.05 mm while the simulative maximum amplitude
of the precession of rotor is up to 0.15 mm, which exceeds the
radial protective gap of the touchdown bearing. The simulation re-
sults prove that the rotor suspended by only SMB will be unstable
at high speed.
Based on prototype of superconducting ACESF shown in Fig. 13,
the tested traces of nutation and precession are shown in Fig. 14
when the rotor suspended by only SMB. We can nd that the max-
imum amplitude of the precession of rotor is up to 0.1 mm while
the maximum amplitude of the nutation of rotor is about
0.018 mm, both of them are smaller than their corresponding sim-
ulative results respectively due to the large stiffness of PM intro-
duced by AMB, but the amplitudes of the nutation and
precession of rotor are too large to ensure the vector of angular
momentum have precise and stable direction.
To suppress the nutation and precession of the high-speed rotor
for the ACESF, M
x
and M
y
are produced by radial AMB and SMB, M
x
is L
sup
k
supr
y
c
+ 2L k
R-AMBc
i
y
and M
y
is L
sup
k
supr
x
c
+ 2L k
R-
AMBc
i
x
in this case. There are two ways to suppress the negative
effects of gyroscopic effect of rotor, one is robust control method,
and the other is cross-feedback control based on the separated
PD type control. But these two methods both depend on the con-
trol current i
y
in M
x
and i
x
in M
y
to realize the suppression of the
0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700 800 900
-200
0
200
400
600
800
1000
1200
1400
Nutation
J / J
z

Precession
Speed of rotor (Hz)
F
r
e
q
u
e
n
c
i
e
s

o
f

v
i
b
r
a
t
i
o
n

(
H
z
)Nutation
J / J
Precession
z
Fig. 12. Frequencies of whirling of high-speed rotor.
Cryogenic system
Superconducting ACESF Vacuum pump
Control system
Fig. 13. Prototype of superconducting ACESF.
0.04 -0.04 0 0.08
x (mm)
0.04
-0.04
0
0.08
-0.08
y

(
m
m
)
0.12 -0.12
-0.08
0.12
-0.12
0.015 -0.015 0 0.03
x (mm)
0.015
-0.015
0
0.03
-0.03
y

(
m
m
)
(a)
(b)
Fig. 14. Tested traces of whirling of rotor (a) precession (b) nutation.
184 J. Tang et al. / Physica C 483 (2012) 178185
nutation and precession of rotor. The tested traces of rotor sus-
pended by SMB together with AMB using cross-feedback based
on separated PD control are shown in Fig. 15, the dotted line circle
with radius of 0.12 mm is the trace of the rotor determined by
touchdown bearings, the amplitude of the vibration of rotor is
0.025 mm, which is only about one fth of the value of the radial
protective gap, all these prove that the rotor is suspended stably
and the AMB is very important to improve the stability of the
high-speed rotor for the ACESF.
6. Summary
In the presented superconducting ACESF, the axial SMB is
entirely passive and is used to stabilize the rotor and to support
the rotor weight partially, the axial AMB does most to reduce the
load of rotor over the axial SMB and to control its axial translation,
a set of radial AMBs are used to control the rotors radial transla-
tion and tilting.
By linearization, the force of SMB and AMB are simplied as
stiffness multiplying the drift of rotor within the neighborhood
of its balanced position. The displacement stiffness of the radial
AMB is 630,000 N/m, which is about 82 times the radial stiffness
of the axial SMB, and the current stiffness of radial AMB is 220 N/A.
The translation of rotor suspended by only SMB, the displace-
ment of rotor will not become zero and the amplitude of the vibra-
tion of rotor is large. The additional PMB can decrease the
amplitude of the vibration of rotor due to its large stiffness but
the rotor is not stable yet. When the rotor is suspended by axial
SMB and AMB with PD control type, the rotor becomes stable
and the amplitude of the vibration of rotor is small. For the high-
speed rigid discal rotor with large inertia, the negative effect of
gyroscopic effect of rotor is prominent, the AMB is very important
to suppress the nutation and precession of rotor by robust control
method or cross-feedback control based on the separated PD type
control for the stability of the high-speed rotor in ACESF.
Acknowledgment
This work was supported in part by the National Natural
Science Foundation of China under Grant 61174003.
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0 0.05 0.1 0.15 0.2 -0.05 -0.1 -0.15 -0.2
x (mm)
0
0.05
0.1
0.15
0.2
-0.05
-0.1
-0.15
-0.2
y

(
m
m
)
0 0.05 0.1 0.15 0.2 -0.05 -0.1 -0.15
x (mm)
0
0.05
0.1
0.15
0.2
-0.05
-0.1
-0.15
y

(
m
m
)
-0.2
-0.2
(a)
(b)
Fig. 15. Tested traces of rotor suspended by SMB together with AMB using cross-feedback based on separated PD control (a) the movement of the upper end of rotor
(measured by sensor A) (b) the movement of the lower end of rotor (measured by sensor B).
J. Tang et al. / Physica C 483 (2012) 178185 185