The attenuation of the levitation force of HTS bulk exposed to AC magnetic field on the above NdFeB guideway

In the present High Temperature Superconducting (HTS) maglev vehicle system, the air gaps between the adjacent permanent magnets make the magnetic fields above the NdFeB guideway non-uniform. So it is required to study the characteristics of levitation force of the HTS bulk affected by the non-uniform applied magnetic fields along the moving direction. In this paper, we have studied the characteristics of the levitation force relaxation by an experiment in which AC magnetic field generated by an electromagnet is used to simulate the time-varying magnetic field caused by the inhomogeneity of the NdFeB guideway. From the experiment results, it is found that the levitation force is attenuated with the application of the AC field, and the attenuation is increased with the amplitude of the AC field, but the attenuation is almost independent of the frequency the AC magnetic field. (C) 2011 Published by Elsevier B.V.