Characteristics Evaluation of a Segmental Rotor Type Switched Reluctance Motor with Concentrated Winding for Torque Density and Efficiency Improvement

With the rapid development of power electronic techniques and the increasing cost of permanent magnets (PMs) materials, switched reluctance motors (SRMs) have recently gained more attention. However, traditional SRMs have a relatively low torque density. For the sake of increasing the motor torque density, this paper proposes a novel segmental rotor type SRM. The proposed motor adopts hybrid stator poles and concentrated windings in the stator side and a segmental rotor structure in the rotor side, which is completely different from the structures of the traditional SRM. The special structure of the motor shortens the magnetic flux paths of the motor, separates the parts of the magnetic flux paths from one another, and eradicates the magnetic flux reversal in the motor stator in order to improve the electric utilization and output torque density of the motor. Meanwhile, the requirement of the magneto-motive force and the core loss of the motor is also decreased, thereby improving the efficiency of the motor. For the purpose of proving the proposed structure, the characteristics of the motor are analyzed using the finite element method and are compared to those of the traditional 12/8 SRM, which is designed for the same application. Moreover, the prototypes of the traditional 12/8 and proposed SRMs are manufactured, and experiments based on the prototypes are performed. Finally, the effectiveness of the structure of the proposed motor is further proven by the experimental results.