The idea of applying magnetic levitation on a train has already been a concept since more than a century ago. Nowadays, nearly all of railroad company still hesitate to focus on it, although our current technology is already more than enough to achieve it. A German joint-venture company, Transrapid has already struggle with applying magnetic levitation on a high-speed train, though they still find some difficulties. Yet Japanese Railway is constructing a long-distance maglev train system and looking forward to showing the world, that the time for maglev train has come, although financially it is still not ready to be launched.
Keywords: High-speed maglev train; Magnetic levitation
Introduction
The train that travels without any contacts…show more content… The main advantage of this system is, it doesn’t require electricity to levitate and cooling device for superconductors. A study from a consulting company found that Inductrack indicates better energy usage and lower maintenance cost [6]. But this technology is still relative new and needs further researches.
Pros and Cons of magnetic levitated trains
At first the idea of a transportation vehicle without rolling resistances on the ground sounds extremly interesting, but there are a lot of things which must be considered. In the following section, there will be a comparison between train on rails and maglev in order to consider the application of maglev trains. Rolling, air and impact resistance
These three components of resistance are decisive for the energy consumption of a high-speed vehicle. The air resistance and impact resistance increase as the velocity rises, while the rolling resistance is velocity-independent. Which could be interpreted, that the air resistance and shock resistance are more important for high-speed-transportation than the rolling