Basic study for a large AC current supply with a single phase air-core Bi2223 high temperature superconducting transformer

The authors have been developing a compact power supply with a single-phase Bi2223 high temperature superconducting (HTS) transformer. The conventional transformer has an iron-core for enhancing magnetic coupling between its primary coil and secondary one. However, the iron-core has great majority of size and weight of the transformer and therefore it is desirable to be removed for a smaller and lighter transformer. In this paper, the authors propose an air-core HTS transformer for a more compact power supply than the conventional one. As experimental results, it is shown that appropriate design of the air-core transformer has a possibility to decrease the weight and volume of the large AC current supply.