The interplay between AC and DC currents in a High-T-c Superconducting (HTS
) coil, made of multifilamentary silver-sheathed Bi-2223 tape, was investig
ated. We observed that the application of a small sinusoidal current in the
frequency range of 50-500 Hz into the coil, while it is already carrying a
DC current in the range of 16-22.5 A, caused an increase in the coil DC vo
ltage. The DC voltage increment due to the AC signal is found to increase l
inearly with frequency and quadratically with amplitude. The DC voltage inc
rement increases as the coil current grows towards its critical value of 22
.2 A. This result may be important in some power applications such as fault
current limiters (FCL) and superconducting magnet energy storage (SMES) ba
sed on HTS coils. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.