A study on the vibration analysis of a Maglev vehicle - A theoretical investigation of the effect of magnetic damping on a vibration control system

The superconducting Maglev system is conceptualized as the next generation high-speed public transportation system. For practical use, it is important to improve the ride comfort particularly in high-speed running. The Maglev vehicle is composed of lightweight car bodies and bogies which are mounted with SCMs (superconducting magnets), on-board refrigerating system, etc. The vibration isolation performance is lower than in conventional railways, since the mass ratio of sprung mass to un-sprung mass in the Maglev vehicle is lower than in the typical railway car. In this magnetically levitated system, the passive electromagnetic damping between the SCMs and ground coils is very small. Therefore, it is important to add active electromagnetic damping to the primary suspension between the SCMs and ground coils, and to adjust the secondary suspension between the car body and bogie. This paper examines lateral and rolling vibration control of the Maglev vehicle using LQ (linear quadratic) control theory. Moreover, the estimated electromagnetic damping, which interacts between the SCMs and the guideway, is also considered in the model to improve the ride comfort.