Comparison evaluation for permanent magnet arrangements of AC permanent magnet contactor

Alternating current (AC) permanent magnet (PM) contactor is a new type of contactor, which coil does not consume energy during its working course. This paper proposes a new structure contactor and analyzes magnet field distributions of PM arrangements both on stator and on armature based on finite element method. The computed results of two arrangements are almost the same for making course, but for breaking course, the arrangement of PM on armature has much more breaking inertia than that of PM on stator for certain supplied voltage. Experiments of displacement versus time verify theoretical prediction.