Permanent magnet synchronous motor(PMSM) is nowadays widely used in industrial applications due to high efficiency, high torque density in comparison to other types of motor. They have been intensively investigated to further improve their performance and overcome their disadvantages.
In order to improve the electromagnetic performance and ease the manufacture process, particularly stator winding, it is often able to employ a modular stator, e.g., individual stator tooth/ back-iron segments, or separate stator tooth segments and back-iron segments. Among them, stator tooth segmentation and back-iron segmentation are the key solutions to ease the process of manufacturing PMSM. However, due to the limitations in the manufacturing process and the tolerances between stator segments, there are additional air gaps. In practice, such gaps are likely to be non-uniform due to manufacture tolerances.
In this study, we proposed a PMSM model with segmented modular stator having a phase concentrated winding. A PMSM model has many advantages when it fails because the stator cores for each phase are separable, and it is possible to substitute the broken stator core section.
First, by using the finite element method (FEM), we obtained the characteristic analysis results considering the additional stator air gaps. The characteristic analysis has been performed considering the additional air gaps between stator core modules. Second, we implemented the experimental set to obtain the torque-speed characteristics and efficiency using a hysteresis dynamometer and a vector control inverter. We examined the experiment at each test point according to defined torque and speed and our results are presented in comparison with the results of the FEM and experimental results. In conclusion, the experiment results show the feasibility and the effectiveness of PMSM with segmented modular stator in the power industry.