Improvement and enlarging of the CFRP flywheel with superconducting magnetic bearings

Superconducting flywheel usually adopts carbon fiber resin mold plastic (CFRP) material that has the basic characteristics such as higher strength and lighter weight. Stabilized rotation of flywheel requires lower unbalance individually about flywheel and supporting disc. And supporting disc is needed to steadily follow the expansion of the inside diameter on the flywheel by centrifugal force and keep the concentricity of the flywheel and its own rotating axis. We developed the flywheel rotor, which was composed of CFRP flywheel, and partially spherical supporting disc made of high strength aluminum. They were combined with expanse fitting each other and most precisely machined to realize the extremely precise axial symmetric shape and enable to be supported and driven at the point near the center of gravity. We manufactured and confirmed that the flywheel rotor rotated up to peripheral speed of 628 m/s quietly without permanent set.