Design and Research an Axial-Flux Magnetic Coupler With Clutch for the Superconducting Flywheel Energy Storage System

High-temperature superconducting flywheel energy storage system generally uses a structure that integrates the superconducting bearing, flywheel, and generator/motor in a vacuum chamber. Although the use of superconducting magnetic levitation bearings and the vacuum chamber eliminates the bearing friction losses and wind resistance friction losses, the integrated structure makes the flywheel and generator/motor cannot disconnect during the energy storage phase. The idling losses of the generator/motor result in energy not being stored for a long time. To address this problem, this article proposes to use the magnetic coupler with a clutch to connect the generator/motor and flywheel, so that the torque transfer can be cut off and idling losses of G/M can be removed during the energy storage phase. This article shows the flux path design, finite element model establishment, and torque transfer characteristics of the magnetic coupler with clutch function.