Thermal-electromagnetic analysis of a fault-tolerant dual-star flux-switching permanent magnet motor for critical applications

This study presents a fault-electromagnetic-thermal model of a fault-tolerant dual-star flux-switching permanent magnet motor. The analytical results in terms of phase currents, rotor velocity and output torque are firstly calculated by a Simulink-MATLAB-based fault (short-circuit) model. Then, the fault and normal phase currents are used in the motor 2D finite element method (FEM) model to calculate the copper and iron losses. As the main heat sources in electrical machines, the obtained copper and iron losses are used in the lumped parameter (LP) and the 3D FEM thermal models to calculate the temperatures of different machine components. Finally, the variation of temperatures of the machine in the presence of faults can be predicted. The results obtained by the LP and the 3D FEM models are also validated by experimental tests. A good agreement has been observed among the analytical, numerical and experimental results. In order to realise the 3D FEM model of the doubly salient rotating machine, a method to transform the salient rotor into a non-salient one have been proposed. Some methods are also proposed to enhance the performance of the cooling system and decrease the maximum temperature of the machine.