Initial Levitation Testing and Design of Magnetic Bearing System for High Speed Turbo-Aerator

This paper concerns the design, construction and initial levitation testing of a full 5-axis magnetic bearing suspen- sion system for an industrial high speed turbo-aerator. The operating speed range of the machine is 16,000 rpm (267 Hz) to 25,000 rpm (417 Hz). The overall turbo aerator configuration is shown and the thrust and radial bearing configurations and design principles are presented. The rotor is a rigid rotor over the operating speed range. The assembled turbo aerator with magnetic bearings is presented with initial test results. The system sensors and power electronics hardware are described in some detail. The casing ping test results are given. The measured PID control results for the rigid rotor for API stability, in terms of AMB system output sensitivity plots show class A operation. Also unbalance rejection control results, with and without the unbalance rejection control, are described.