Eddy Current Losses in the Rotor Teeth of Aerospace Homopolar Alternators

The eddy current losses in rotor tooth-heads of homopolar alternators are generally high and a limiting factor of design. A method is established to calculate eddy current losses in rotor designs with titanium wedges in the intertooth space. A computer program solves numerically the boundary value problem that yields the electric field intensity in the conducting materials. Inverter loads on an experimental 95 KVA, 3,400 cps, three-phase homopolar alternator are calculated to be approximately five percent.