A novel axial flux switched reluctance motor with grain oriented electrical steel

Switched reluctance motor (SRM) has been widely used in automobile and aerospace for its fault tolerance and simple construction [1]. According to the direction of magnetization, SRM can be classified as radial flux and axial flux types. Axial flux switched reluctance motor (AFSRM) with its flat shape and high aspect ratio is regarded to be suitable for in-wheel motor applications. An axial flux segmented rotor-switched reluctance motor topology is suggested in [2] to increase active surface area for the output torque within a confined space. However, torque and efficiency of the AFSRM are less than those of PMSM for the same frame size. To solve above problems, grain oriented electrical steel (GOES) could be used for AFSRM to improve the electromagnetic properties because the material has a good magnetic characteristic in the rolling direction. A design of AFSRM for traction application was proposed in [3]GOES has been used in stator to reduce leakage flux, divided segments in c-core structure may be a challenge to the joint strength of the structure.