Sub-domain analytical model for armature reaction field of permanent magnet vernier machine

An analytical sub-domain model is developed for predicting the armature magnetic field in permanent magnet vernier machine (PMVM) which has either non-overlapping or overlapping windings. The developed model accounts for tooth-tips and flux modulation pole slots (FMPs). The paper aims to discuss these issues.

It is obtained by solving Poisson’s and Laplace’s equations in polar coordinates for each sub-domain, i.e. air gap, slots, slot openings at tooth-tips and FMP slots. Armature reaction field distributions in slots, slot openings FMPs, air-gap and magnet region and winding inductances are obtained from the analytical method and compared by finite element analysis.

It is found that the developed model can be employed to accurately predict the armature field and winding inductance for any combination of slots/FMPs/permanent magnets. In addition, it is observed that the winding inductance is high which results in significant armature reaction and poor power factor in PMVM.

The main contributions include: first, accurate sub-domain model for PMVM is proposed for armature reaction which is not addressed in literature; second, the model accounts the interaction between FMP and slot; and finally, developed sub-domain model is also used for inductance calculation.