A Study on Core Skew for Performance Improvement of Double-Layer Spoke Type PMSM

Abstract

The spoke type permanent magnet synchronous motor (PMSM), which is a general ferrite magnetic flux concentrated motor, has a low portion of reluctance torque at the total torque magnitude. Therefore, as a way to increase the reluctance torque, there is a double-layer spoke type PMSM that can maximize the difference in inductance between the d-axis and the q-axis. However, in the double-layer spoke type PMSM, cogging torque, torque ripple, and total harmonic distortion (THD) increase as reluctance torque is maximized, which is the main cause of vibration and noise. In this paper, a method is proposed that provides the same effect as skew without dividing stages of the permanent magnet by dividing the core of the rotor into two types so that it is easy to manufacture according to the number of stages unlike extant skew methods. Based on the method, the reduction of cogging torque and THD was verified by Finite Element Analysis (FEA).1. IntroductionThe general interior permanent magnet synchronous motor (IPMSM) uses NdFeB magnets to take advantage of the high airgap magnetic flux density. However, it had an adverse impact on cost of the motor because there are fluctuation of the cost from limited sources of heavy rare earth. Therefore, for stable supply of permanent magnets, a lot of development of a spoke type permanent magnet synchronous motor (PMSM), which is a structure capable of concentrating magnetic flux by using a ferrite magnet having a low magnetic flux density, has been conducting. The spoke type PMSM concentrates the magnetic flux density and can replace the NdFeB magnet used in the extant PMSM with a ferrite magnet.However, in general spoke type PMSM, the portion of reluctance torque is low because the difference in inductance between the d-axis and the q-axis is not large. In order to further utilize this reluctance torque, a double-layer spoke type shape that can maximize the difference in inductance between the d-axis and the q-axis can be used to bigger reluctance torque to improve motor performance.However, increasing the reluctance torque increases cogging torque, torque ripple, and total harmonic distortion (THD), which in turn leads to vibration and noise problems. Therefore, the double-layer spoke type PMSM needs a design that can reduce cogging torque and THD. As a representative method, it can be solved by applying skew to the rotor, but the conventional method of applying skew is not a good method in terms of productivity because it is difficult to manufacture because it divides the stages of the permanent magnet. For ameliorate of the limitation, the shape of the rotor core is divided and cross-stacked into stack1 and stack2 so that the permanent magnet can be inserted in one shape as the conventional shape.Therefore, the shape of the rotor core is divided into stack1 and stack2 so that the permanent magnet can be inserted in one shape as before and cross-stacked. The stack1 cuts the left part fixing the permanent magnet, and the stack2 cuts the right part fixing the permanent magnet to apply the same effect as skew. In this paper, this is expressed as a core skew, and through this core skew, the design to reduce cogging torque, torque ripple, and THD is conducted while considering productivity.2. Concept of Core SkewThe core skew represents the stacking of only cores of opposite shapes when stacking the rotor cores of the motor. The contents of the basic theory are as follows.Fig. 1 shows stack No. 1 and stack No. 2, respectively. Due to the shape of the rotor core, the phases of the airgap magnetic flux density of stack No.1 and stack No.2 are shifted, and when the two stacks are synthesized due to the phase of the shifted airgap magnetic flux density. As shown in Fig. 2, the cogging torque decreases.Also Fig. 1 shows the shape of applying core skew to the conventional model by intersecting and stacking stack No. 1 and stack No. 2 .Through this core skew structure, research to reduce cogging torque, torque ripple, and THD is conducted. Most of the original skew research is conducted in 3D FEA, but since 3D FEA requires a lot of time, first calculate the optimal model using 2D FEA and then proceed with 3D FEA according to the number of steps considering 3D effect. The final result will be revealed on full paper.AcknowledgmentThis work was supported by the Technology Innovation Program (No. 20011495) funded By the Ministry of Trade, Industry & Energy(MOTIE, Korea), in part by the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) Grant funded by the Korean government. (No. 2020R1A2C1013724). **