Investigating a transverse flux machine with intermediate poles

Conventional surface-mounted transverse flux machines utilise only half the magnets at any one time. An alternate TFM (transverse flux machine) concept, presented in 1992 allows simultaneous utilisation of all magnets, by introducing geometrical complexity in the stator. The current work investigates this TFM variant and compares it with the more conventional surface mounted TFMs. Design and analysis procedure for this machine is described. It is explained why an initial analytical design of this TFM variant failed in the 3D-FEM analysis. It is found that this machine suffers from significant 3D leakage, which is perhaps one of the reasons of its failure to gain popular acceptance, in spite of having many beneficial features over the more conventional TFMs. Guidelines, illustrating how this 3D leakage can be reduced are provided. Finally, it is concluded that this machine requires larger diameters as compared to conventional TFMs.