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A

Seminar Report

On

ACTIVE MAGNETIC BEARING

By

Mr. WADEKAR BHAGVAT ANANDRAO

Exam. Seat No. T-80120943 Roll No. 185

Under the guidance of


Prof. N.D.SADAPHAL

DEPARTMENT OF MECHANICAL ENGINEERING


S. R. E. S. COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING, KOPARGAON
UNIVERSITY OF PUNE
2013-14
CERTIFICATE

THIS IS TO CERTIFY THAT THE SEMINAR

Entitled

ACTIVE MAGNETIC BEARING

Submitted by

Mr. WADEKAR BHAGVAT ANANDRAO

Examination Seat No. T-80120943

For the partial fulfillment for the award of


Degree of Bachelor of Engineering in Mechanical of

University of Pune, Pune is approved.

Prof. N.D. SADAPHAL Dr. A. G. Thakur

(Guide) (Head, Dept. of Mech. Engg.)

Prof. P.M. PATARE


(Examiner)
Abstract

More than thirty years of research and application experience have led to Active
Magnetic Bearings (AMB), which allow unique applications for rotating machinery with
excellent performance. The main part is devoted to recent research topics, as a challenge to
young researchers in rotor dynamics, mechatronics design and control.
Active magnetic bearings, a typical mechatronics product have been successfully applied
in industrial turbomachinery. Their main advantages are the contactless working principle, the
frictionless suspension, and that they represent an active system. Therefore, the active magnetic
bearings are well suited to operate contactless as actuator and sensor elements in rotating
machinery.
The report describes about the construction, working principles, advantages,
disadvantages, applications & uses of AMBs. A unique aspect of the design is the two additional
radial AMBs to allow the application of simulated destabilizing fluid or electromagnetic forces
to the rotor. These forces are difficult to predict and can lead to rotordynamic instability of
industrial machinery if not properly accounted for. The AMB provides a realistic platform to
evaluate stabilizing control algorithms for high performance turbomachinery.
INDEX

Sr. Content Page No.


No.
1.1 INTRODUCTION 01

1.2 LITERATURE SURVEY 01

1.3 SCOPE OF PRESENT INVESTIGATION 02

1.4 TYPES OF MAGNETIC BEARINGS 03

1.5 COMPONENTS OF AMBs 03

1.6 TYPES OF AMBs

1. RADIAL AMBs 05

2. THRUST AMBs 07

3. CONICAL AMBs 08

1.7 CONTROL SYSTEM 08

1.8 LOSSES IN AMBs 11

1.9 ADVANTAGES & DISADVANTAGES 12

1.10 APPLICATIONS 13

1.10 CONCLUSION 15

1.11 REFERENCE 16

1.13 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT 17
LIST OF FIGURES

Fig. Name of figure Page


No. No.
1 TYPES OF MAGNETIC BEARINGS. 03

2 COMPONENTS OF AMB 05

3 RADIAL MAGNETIC BEARING 06

4 SIMPLE HORSESHOE ELECTROMAGNET 06

5 THRUST BEARING 08

6 CONTROL SYSTEM 09

7 LOSSES IN AMBs 11
1.1 INTRODUCTION
A bearing is a machine element, which supports another moving machine
element. It permits relative motion between the contact surfaces of the members,
while carrying load. Due to relative motion, friction occurs and rubbing surface wears
rapidly.
Active Magnetic Bearings (AMBs) are a relatively recent innovation in
bearing technology. Active magnetic bearings (AMBs) represent a preferred
alternative to conventional mechanical bearing designs in a variety of machinery
applications.
The AMB is a device that uses electromagnetic forces to support a rotor
without mechanical contact. The non-contacting support of the shaft eliminates losses
in the bearings due to friction. Conditions such as extreme temperature, corrosive
working fluids, and extreme cleanliness, often preclude the use of conventional
lubricated bearings.
This design has many benefits over conventional bearings. Some advantages
of implementing an AMB system include complete elimination of oil-based
lubrication systems, low parasitic power loss, direct control of the rotordynamics,
lower maintenance costs, and longer system life.

1.2 LITERATURE SURVEY

First investigations on the physics of suspending a body freely by magnetic


field forces go back to Earnshaw (1842) and Braunbek (1939). A patent of Kemper
(1937) showed the potential of AMB for magnetically levitated vehicles and the
experiments of Beams demonstrated a spectacular high speed application, where mm-
sized steel balls were rotated freely with up to 300 kHz until they burst.
First industrial-like applications of AMB were initiated by Habermann for
aerospace momentum wheels. The interest in AMB grew with the implementation of
digital control with microprocessors, emphasizing the role of software as a prominent
element within the machine, eventually leading to the concept of smart machines. The
industrialization about 20 years ago came with the availability of design tools for

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modeling rotor dynamics and control, and with the advances of hardware for power
electronics.

3. SCOPE OF PRESENT INVESTIGATION

The purpose of my work is to take an initial look at how the AMBs are
superior to other conventional frictional bearings. I have collected the data & studied
about their construction, working and about their other parameters. I had found that
AMBs have tremendous advantages over frictional bearings.
This report is to explain the necessary steps that were taken to achieve the task
of theoretically building a Magnetic Bearing Actuator. The bearing had to be
optimized in accordance to certain design criteria (such as coil area, resultant force on
the journal, minimum core volume etc.)
The main aim of the design was to make sure that:
 The bearing develops the required load capacity (slightly higher).
 The winding temperature was within the acceptable range for the required
insulator class.
To simplify the analysis as much as possible, testing and modeling has been
performed on a single radial AMB and a rigid non-rotating shaft in order to gain an
understanding of the basic mechanisms at work. A linear model of this rotor-bearing
system undergoing base excitation has been developed based on common assumptions
used in AMB analysis.
Therefore, the scope of this report includes the development of this linearized
model of a single AMB undergoing base excitation, working of a 2-axis, 8-pole radial
magnetic bearing and stub shaft undergoing base excitation, and the comparison of
the model results with experimental results. This study also lays the groundwork for
future use of AMBs and analysis of the rotor-bearing system.

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1.4 TYPES OF MAGNETIC BEARINGS

MAGNETIC
BEARINGS

ACTIVE MAGNETIC
BEARINGS.
1. Radial magnetic
PASSIVE MAGNETIC ALL ACTIVE
bearing. BEARING. MAGNETIC BEARINGS
2. Thrust magnetic
bearing.
3. Cone magnetic

Fig. 1 Types of Magnetic Bearings.

1.5 COMPONENTS OF ACTIVE MAGNETIC BEARING


Electromagnets are composed of a soft magnetic core and electrical coils.
They look somewhat like the stator of an electrical motor. Fig.2 shows the
components of AMB

1.5.1 Iron Core


The iron core is a material conducting the magnetic field to the air gap. Its
magnetic permeability has to be high, as well as its magnetic saturation. In order to
minimize eddy current losses, the core usually consists of insulated lamination sheets.

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2. Windings
The current through the winding is the source of magnetic field. The winding
is made of an insulated conductor wound on the soft magnetic core. In order to
improve the efficiency of the AMB, the conductor has to have a low electrical
resistance and must be wound with a high fill-factor.

3. Rotor
The rotor, in standard constructions, is realized with a lamination packet
shrinked on a non-magnetic shaft. Tight manufacturing tolerances are needed in order
to avoid unbalances. The mechanical properties of the rotor lamination have to be
good, in order to overcome the centrifugal stress due to high speed rotation.

4. Position Sensors
In most applications, there are position sensors in AMBs. Since AMBs are
actively controlled regarding to the sensor signal, the control performance strongly
depends on the sensor performance. Several sensor types are used in AMBs:
inductive, eddy current, capacity and optical displacement sensors.

5. Controller
Today controllers are mainly based on digital technology. They provide a
great flexibility and high computation speed. Digital controllers enable principally an
adaptative control, unbalance compensation and provide a great tool for system
diagnosis. For real time processing, Digital Signal Processors (DSPs) are used. AMBs
are controlled in closed-loop. Different methods such as PD, PID, optimal output
feedback or observer based state feedback are in use.

6. Power Amplifiers
The power amplifiers convert the control signals into control currents.
Switching amplifiers are usually used because of their low losses. The amplifier is
often the limitating component in an AMB system.

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Fig.2 Components of AMB

1.6 TYPES OF ACTIVE MAGNETIC BEARINGS

1.6.1 RADIAL AMB


AMB systems consist of five basic components, which include the actuator,
sensor, controller, amplifier and rotor. Figure 1.1 gives a simplified schematic of these
basic components as they are used in one axis of a radial AMB system.
The AMB system as shown in Figure 1.1 works by detecting the shaft position
using a position sensor. As a result, this sensor measures the relative displacement
between the bearing stator and the rotor. This position signal is then sent to the
controller, which adjusts the current level to the actuators through the use of a current
amplifier.
The change in current within the actuator coils will either increase or decrease
the force placed on the rotor based on this change, which adjusts the position of the
rotor within the stator. The bearing actuators are electromagnets consisting of coils of
wire wrapped around a ferromagnetic material. The force capacity of these
electromagnets can be calculated based on simplified magnetic circuit analysis.

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Fig.3 Radial Magnetic Bearing

Fig.4 Simple Horseshoe Electromagnet


Currents in the wire coils induce a magnetic field within the actuator material,
across both air gaps between the actuator and target (rotor) and in the rotor as shown

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in Figure 1.5. The magnetic field across the air gaps results in an attractive force on
the rotor. This force is dependent on the geometry of the magnet, the current in the
wires and the distance between the stator and rotor. The magnetic force applied to the
rotor has been derived from basic electromagnetic circuit theory and is given by,

Where,
‘o’ is the permeability.
‘Ag’ is a single pole face area (m2),
‘N’ is the total number of wire coils,
‘g’ is the gap distance (m) and
‘I’ is the current (Amps).
A dimensionless loss factor, , is also included to account for magnetic field
fringing and leakage effects along with geometric losses due to curvature.
From above Equation it is shown that the force is inversely proportional to the
gap distance squared, indicating that as the rotor gets closer to the stator the stator
pulls harder on the rotor. This is an important observation related to magnetic
bearings. The forces in a magnetic bearing are always attractive. As a result, a control
system must be used to stabilize the system. The control system accomplishes this by
counteracting the potential increase in the attractive force due to the gap becoming
smaller by decreasing the current supplied to the magnet. In general the controllers
will simply supply equal and opposite currents to these magnet pairs to provide the
stabilizing force.

1.6.2 THRUST AMB


Axial or thrust magnetic bearings are used for rotary motion where the
primary external loads are parallel to the axis of rotation. They use a flat, solid
ferromagnetic disc secured to the rotor as the collar, the axial thrust bearing. Solid
disc electromagnets are situated both side of the collar and operate in a similar manner
to the radial bearing above but in one dimension only.

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Fig.5 Thrust Bearing

1.6.3 CONICAL AMB


Conical magnetic bearings are used when the bearing may be subjected
to both radial and axial loads. These bearings are designed with a conical shaped
stator and rotor.

1.7 CONTROL SYSTEM

The control system allows the current in the bearing to be controlled by


feeding back information on the position of the shaft. This is called closed loop
feedback control and is necessary for the shaft to be held in a stable position. In
simple terms, the control system reduces the upper bearing current when the shaft is

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above the center position and increases the current when the shaft is below the center
position.
Typically, magnetic bearing control is performed in a single input-single
output (SISO) manner. This means that the position information from one sensor
causes only the control current in the corresponding axis to be varied.

Fig.6 Control System

Control systems can also be multi-input and multi-output (MIMO). MIMO is


used when higher levels of control are required or when significant cross-coupling
between axes is expected.
The components of the control system include a position sensor and
accompanying electronics, a controller, and amplifiers. These components are
described below.

SENSORS:-
The sensors feed information about the position of the shaft to the controller in
the form of an electrical voltage. Normally, the sensors are calibrated so that the when
the shaft is in the desired position, the sensor produces a null voltage. When the shaft
is moved above this desired position, a positive voltage is produced and when it is
moved below, a negative voltage results.

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CONTROLLER:-
The function of the controller is to receive the voltage signal from the position
sensors, process this information and send current requests to the amplifiers. The
controller consists of anti-aliasing filters, analog-to-digital signal processor and Pulse-
Width Modulation (PMM) generators.
The voltage from the position sensors is passed through the anti-aliasing filters
to eliminate high frequency noise from the signal. This noise can cause the signal to
inaccurately represent the position of the shaft. In addition, because the controller
periodically samples the signal, some of the high-frequency information can “fold
over” into false low frequency information, thus aliasing the information received by
the controller.
After the high frequency content is removed, the position signal is sampled by
the Analog to Digital (A/D) converter. This converts the voltage signal to a form that
can be processed by the digital signal processor. The digital information is then
passed through a digital filter by the digital signal processor. This produces an output
proportional to the amount of current required to correct the position error in the shaft.
The requested current is compared to the actual current in the bearing, which is also
sensed, filtered and sampled with an analog-to-digital converter. The error between
the actual and requested current is used to characterize the PWM signal sent to the
amplifiers.
This information is sent to the pulse-width modulation generators which create
the PWM wave form sent to the amplifiers. The delivery of the control current
request must occur well before the next sample of the shaft position is taken. The
sampling and control delivery process is repeated at a frequency of 10 kHz.

AMPLIFIERS:-
Each bearing axis has a pair of amplifiers to provide current to the bearing
coils and provide an attractive force to correct the position of the rotor along that
particular axis. The amplifiers are simply high voltage switches that are turned on the
off at a high frequency, as commanded by the PWM signal from the controller.

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1.8 LOSSES IN AMBs

Fig.7 Losses in the AMBs

With contact-free rotors there is no friction in the magnetic bearings. The


operation of active magnetic bearings causes much less losses than operating
conventional ball or journal bearings but nevertheless, the losses have to be taken into
account and sometimes they lead to limitations.
Losses can be grouped into losses arising in the stationary parts, in the rotor
itself, and losses related to the design of the control.
1. Losses in the stationary parts of the bearing come mainly from copper losses
in the windings of the stator and from losses in the amplifiers. The copper losses are a
heat source and if no sufficient cooling is provided, can limit the control current and
hence the maximal achievable carrying force.
2. Losses in the rotor part are more complex and lead to more severe limitations.
These losses comprise iron losses caused by hysteresis and eddy currents, and air drag
losses. The losses heat up the rotor, cause a breaking torque on the rotor, and have to
be compensated by the drive power of the motor. The relations of the various losses
with respect to one another are shown in Figure 1.4. In general, the eddy current
losses are the largest ones.

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1.9 ADVANTAGES & DISADVANTAGES
ADVANTAGES:-
 Reliability of these bearings is more compared to conventional bearings. No wear
takes place as there is no contact between stationary and rotating parts.
 Practical generators due to wear and the need for lubrication are eliminated.
Hence the process can’t contaminate with oil, grease or solid particles.
 The fact that the rotor spins in space without contact with the sensor means drag
on the rotor is minimum. This allows the bearing to run at extremely high speeds.
 Magnetic bearings use advanced control algorithms to influence the motion of the
shaft and therefore have the inherent capability to precisely control the position of
the shaft within microns and to virtually eliminate vibration.
 These bearings are capable of operating through an extremely wide range such as
– 2500 deg C to 2200 deg C, thus allowing operation where conventional bearings
cannot function.
 These can operate in corrosive environments by means of canning both stationary
and rotating parts.
 A magnetic bearing functions by determining rotor position rotor vibration and
bearing load. This information which is processed in an electronic control cabinet
can be used to detect incipient faults, plan maintenance and optimize performance.

DISADVANTAGES:-
 Magnetic bearings have a specific load capacity (maximum load per unit area
of application) lower than other bearings. These results in bearings, which will
be physically larger than other similarly, specified bearings.

 The complexity of magnetic bearings is higher than competing technologies.


However, magnetic bearing life cycle cost can often by less than the
traditional bearing.
 Magnetic bearings require power to drive the control system, sensors and
electromagnets. Magnetic bearing system represents a completely different
approach to the support of rotating equipments.

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1.10 APPLICATIONS
Magnetic bearings were selected for several reasons, among them:
 Coated magnetic bearings operate within the process control system that
ensures the highest quality pulp.
 Coated magnetic bearings operate within the process-on seals are required,
eliminating a common cause of downtime.
 The integrated design resulted in a solution with minimum part count and
maximum performance.
1. 100,000 rpm milling spindle:
100,000 rpm machine tool spindle for high speed three axis machining center.
This spindle is a prototype demonstration. Magnetic bearings were necessary to
achieve the extremely high speed. However, the primary concern is consistent, high
quality surface finish. Magnetic bearings will allow a much longer service interval
than the rolling element bearings normally used.

2. Refrigeration compressor:
This is a hermetic, oil-free compressor for refrigeration and chiller
applications using new CFC-free refrigerants.
Oil-free operation is essential to maintain high cycle efficiency with this new
class of refrigerant. In addition, there is no oil in the system to decrease the heat
transfer efficiency of heat exchangers. Magnetic bearings were chosen as an enabling
technology.

3. Grinding spindle :
This high speed motorized spindle is designed for operation in a computer
controlled grinder used in rolling bearing production.
Magnetic bearings give this spindle a much wider operating range, allowing
one spindle to be used where two conventional spindles are used. This improves
productivity by reducing resetting time. It is hoped that the magnetic bearings can be
used to actively improve grinding performance using process feedback concepts.

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4. High speed spindle :
This prototype spindle was constructed for use in a high speed machining
center. Although not yet in production, the spindle demonstrates many benefits of
magnetic bearings in this application. Magnetic bearings allow a high speed, high
power spindle to deliver consistent performance. Performance is not affected by
thermal issues or by wear. Service intervals are greatly increased over conventional
bearings. The magnetic bearings automatically detect overload situations and instantly
shut down the machining operation.

5. Pulp refiner :
This pulp refiner represents a new product direction for this well-established
OEM. The 220 kW, 900 rpm unit is the first of three base pulp refiner sizes
planned by the manufacturer. The current innovation, which includes magnetic
bearings, provides the OEM with the competitive advantages (listed below)
necessary to secure a dominant position in this competitive market.

In short Following are the main applications of the AMBs


 Turbo molecular pumps.
 Blood pumps.
 Molecular beam choppers.
 Contact free linear guides.
 Variable speed spindles.
 Pipeline compressor.
 Elastic rotor control.
 Test rig for high speed tires.
 Magnarails and maglev systems.
 Gears, Chains, Conveyors etc.
 Energy Storage Flywheels.
 High precision position stages.
 Active magnetic dampers.
 Smart Aero Engines.
 Turbo machines.

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1.11 CONCLUSION
Advances in magnetic material, control have contributed to the realization of
completely non-contacting relating systems employing magnetic bearings to eliminate
the last remaining wear out prone element. Current efforts are being directed more
towards reducing the size, weight and complexity of these devices to achieve
complete acceptance.
The AMB technology has been briefly reviewed including its advantages,
components, working principles, cost and performance. Some design and
Implementation issues have been also discussed.
The taking into consideration the above advantages, the adoption of magnetic
bearings in industry will be more economical, efficient and environment friendly
compared to the conventional bearings. The authors believe that AMB systems are
still relatively more expensive than conventional mechanical bearings; therefore the
massive used of AMB in industries is still prohibitive despite of the many benefits
offered. The AMBs will still not completely replace conventional bearings in rotating
machineries in the near future. However, AMB can find its place well in a limited
volume of high performance rotating machines.

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1.12 REFERENCES

i. “G. van Schoor, A.C. Niemann, C.P. du Rand”, “Evaluation of demodulation


algorithms for robust self-sensing active magnetic bearings”, “147 August
2012’
ii. “M. Aenis, E. Knopf, R. Nordmann”, “Active magnetic bearings for the
identification and fault diagnosis in turbomachinary” “year 2002”
iii. “S.C. Mukhopadhyay, C. Gooneratne and G. Sen Gupta”, “Magnetic Bearing:
An Integrated Platform for Teaching and Learning”, “2nd International
Conference on Autonomous Robots and Agents December 13-15, 2004”
iv. “Gerhard Schweitzer” “Applications and Research Topics for Active Magnetic
Bearings” “Proc. IUTAM-Symp. on Emerging Trends in Rotor Dynamics,
March 23-26, 2009, Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, India. Springer-
Verlag”
v. Mechanical Engineering – Volume111/No.12 – Eisenberg B.

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1.13 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I would to like acknowledge with a great sense of great gratitude to many


people who have extended their kind co-operation and guidance and have made this
seminar successful.
The credit to great measure goes to my guide Prof. N.D. SADAPHAL whose
valuable guidance and keen interest encouraged me to complete the seminar in a
successful manner and kept an eye to proceed me on right track.
I am also thankful to head of department Prof. A.G. THAKUR (Vice
Principal of SRES COE, Kopargaon) for his moral as well as technical support and
all the staff of mechanical department.

Mr. Wadekar Bhagvat A.


Roll No. 185
T.E. (Mechanical)

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