Magnetic equivalent circuits

The possibilities of using magnetic, instead of electric, equivalent circuits for eddy-current devices, which have recently been pointed out by Laithwaite, are here explored further. Couplings between distributed flux paths and windings can be expressed in terms of a generalised linkage parameter N, which is associated with flux linkage in electric circuits, and with an analogous current linkage in the magnetic equivalent. The magnetic-circuit treatment extends to rotating, as well as to static, devices, and leads to a view of induction machines as nonpassive magnetic elements. The relationships between the energy flow through the terminals, the mechanical forces and the magnetic terminal parameters are examined, and an alternative equivalent circuit, in which the analogue of current is not the flux but its rate of change, is shown to be in many respects a more useful one. The force equations are applicable, in particular, to devices in which induced currents are important.