Fast starting cold shield cooling circuit for superconducting generators

摘要

An apparatus is provided for rapidly restarting the flow of coolant through the cold electromagnetic shield of a superconducting rotor following a thermal transient episode. A vortex diode inhibits coolant flow in the undesirable reverse direction and encourages the reestablishment of a normal thermosyphon cooling loop flow quickly following the termination of a thermal transient such as that caused by transmission line faults. The present invention requires no moving parts and may therefore be permanently sealed in the superconducting rotor without risk of costly repair efforts caused by components failure.