Abstract
Impedance measurements on scale models can be an extraordinarily simple and effective technique for comparing the lift and drag forces and the static and dynamic stabilities of various vehicle-guideway configurations for levitation by motion-induced eddy-current repulsion. The real and imaginary components of the input impedance of an inductive circuit are a measure of its power loss and magnetic energy storage, and the gradient of that energy is magnetic force. As a demonstration of the technique, we have applied it to variations of the magneplane system being developed by the MIT-Avco-Raytheon group.