Using electro-plating rectifier as a low-voltage high-current power supply

[stube40]

We've been looking for a low-voltage high-current power supply for our lab to put between 200A and 1000A through a superconducting coil with inductance of 50mH. Total resistance of the load will be around 0.1 Ohm.

The only thing I've been able to find so far is an electro-plating rectifier. Although it's called a rectifier, as far as I can see it's actually a low-voltage high-current PSU.

The manual (attached) is not very informative. It is a 3-phase input. Switchable DC output from 0-15V and 0-1000Amps. It is based on IGBTs. Power factor of 0.95, 2% ripple. It has either constant current or constant voltage operation.

It's very expensive ($12500!!!) and I'm worried about buying it and then it not doing what we require (or, even worse, we break it because we're mis-using it).

Can anyone shed any light on whether we're going doing the wrong track or not?

[Hero999]

The coil is not superconducting, otherwise its resistance will be zero.

The power supply doesn't have a high enough voltage, at 15V the current will only be 150A into a 0.1 Ohm load.

[stube40]

By "load" I meant the entire load that the PSU sees. The coil itself is made of Type 2 Sumitomo superconducting tape which zero resistance. However, the copper surround and interconnects have small resistances associated with them.

Sorry, but my resistance estimate of 0.1 Ohm missed a zero and you are correct that V = IR breaks down with 0.1Ohm.  We are using 4G power cable (7x7x34x0.12mm) which has a resistance of 0.97mOhm per metre. The copper interconnects are a fraction of this. If we used 10 metres of this stuff then the overall resistance would still be around 0.01Ohm.

[awright]

Sorry to make such an obvious suggestion, but have you asked the manufacturer of the power supply how his unit will handle your load and what precautions to take?

Looks OK to me but then, it's not my $12K.

awright