Study of variable reluctance vernier motor for hybrid electric vehicle

We have investigated the variable reluctance vernier motor, VRVM, the primary feature of which is that higher torque can be expected compared with the conventional synchronous reluctance motor. In addition, unlike switched reluctance motors, the VRVM can be driven by a three-phase inverter. We first designed a VRVM to achieve the target torque characteristic, which is the characteristic of the motor mounted on the Honda Insight, which employs a parallel HEV system. As a result, two problems were identified as important problems that should be resolved. The first problem is that the torque pulsation was very large, and the second problem is inferior efficiency. With respect to the first problem, the shape of the rotor salient-pole was examined in order to reduce the torque pulsation. With respect to the second problem, the use of a magnetic steel sheet with less iron loss was examined. As the result of our examinations, the torque ripple was reduced from 36% to 24%, and the maximum efficiency improved from 92.3% to 96.2%.