Design of magnetic bearings for turbo refrigerant compressors

Magnetic bearings are oil-free bearings that are widely employed in turbo machineries such as turbo refrigerant compressors in order to eliminate lubrication systems, avoid contamination, and increase efficiency. We have developed a 145 refrigerant ton (RT)-class turbo refrigerant compressor using homopolar-type radial hybrid magnetic bearings (HMBs) and thrust magnetic bearings. The thrust magnetic bearing comprises a thrust HMB and a permanent magnet that generate downward forces to overcome high upward thrust forces of 2000 N at 21 000 rpm. A test rig and controller for the compressor with magnetic bearings were fabricated, and rotordynamics such as the unbalance response and axial displacement were investigated. Rotordynamics analyses using the finite element method predicted that the 1st bending mode is located at a high frequency with sufficient margin from the operating speeds. Further, the zero-to-peak displacement caused by the unbalanced response was sufficiently small. The rotor was stably supported with few vibrations across the entire range of the operational speeds. Our results demonstrate that the advantages of oil-free bearings can be easily exploited in turbo machineries such as turbo refrigerant compressors by adopting HMBs