Talk:Maglev

Southwest Jiaotong University, China

This subsection contains the following:

On December 31, 2000, the first crewed high-temperature superconducting maglev was tested successfully at Southwest Jiaotong University, Chengdu, China. This system is based on the principle that bulk high-temperature superconductors can be levitated or suspended stably above or below a permanent magnet. The load was over 530 kg (1166 lb) and the levitation gap over 20 mm (0.79 in). The system uses liquid nitrogen, which is very cheap, to cool the superconductor.

I'm baffled by this. I don't know whether this is a mistranslation or what, but I do know that you cannot use liquid nitrogen to cool something to a high temperature. Unfortunately there is no cite to go to for clarification, so I've added a cite needed tag.

I'm rather tempted to delete the whole section as patent nonsense, but something about it suggests that there is more to it than that. So I'll hold fire for a while and see if anybody reacts to the tag. If not, it is toast. -- Starbois (talk) 11:18, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Wondering whether cooling can achieve high temperature? Say it's a winter afternoon. The temperature outside is at a maximum ('high') of, say, zero degrees Celsius. Now you put a glass of warm water outside while the temperature is as high as it ever was that day. Now will water at room temperature "cool" to the wintertime high or *warm to that temperature? 02:13, 26 September 2010 (UTC)LeucineZIpper —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.184.234.24 (talk) 02:17, 26 September 2010 (UTC)LeucineZipper

In this case, "high temperature" is referring specifically to superconductors. A "high-temperature superconductor" is one that uses temperatures that are relatively much higher than the ones we have been using. They are still very cold "liquid nitrogen" temperatures, but "high-temperature superconductor" is a technical term used to separate new magnet technologies from the old ones. -- Dmitry Murashchik —Preceding unsigned comment added by 167.102.22.42 (talk) 17:37, 21 October 2010 (UTC)

[It doesn't say it cools something to a high temperature, even isolating the final sentence from its context. It couldn't be clearer to a native English reader. JohndanR (talk) 16:09, 19 January 2024 (UTC)]

‘Development’ vs. ‘History’

The Development section seems to focus only on two major British developments, and then the History section after it seems to include a more detailed history from various American, German, Japanese, Russian and British patents and constructions. Why the separate section that seems to simply select the British developments? This seems to serve to mislead people into thinking it was a wholly British invention. I suggest its contents be merged into History and the separate heading removed. Harsimaja (talk) 01:36, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

POV

This article is extremely pro-maglev to a clearly unwarranted extent (considering how few maglevs are even under construction). This is evident even by just looking at the sources it cites - for example, it cites this article solely for maglevs' power consumption (and only cites it in the lede - the increased power consumption of maglevs isn't present in the power consumption section!) and doesn't mention the many other criticisms of maglevs it has. I'm sure there are also piles and piles of reliable sources criticising maglevs it doesn't cite. Eldomtom2 (talk) 14:52, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

Introduction rewrite

Hi, I've rewritten the introduction. Previously it was a mess (like the rest of the article) and I've done my best with it, but if anyone has any questions or concern about what I've changed, please reply here. If I have the time/energy, I'm planning to rewrite other sections of the article as well. 219.89.31.196 (talk) 05:02, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

T-Flight Does Not Qualify as Train

I've reverted recent edits which updated the train speed record to T-Flight as I don't believe the T-Flight qualifies as a train. In Railway speed record, "trains" are assumed to mean "Passenger trains", but the T-Flight vehicle appears in pictures to be about the size of a car and unable to carry passengers. Furthermore, the 623 km/h speed record was achieved on just 2km of track. This would have required acceleration/deceleration of over 1g, which in my opinion, makes the T-Flight more comparable to a rocket sled.

As a point of comparison, the previously listed speed record was achieved by the L0 Series Shinkansen while carrying passengers in a 7 car set which was at least 170m long. 219.89.31.196 (talk) 03:59, 16 March 2024 (UTC)