2015 International Conference on Sustainable Mobility Applications, Renewables and Technology (SMART)

3D MEC Modeling of a Hybrid-Excited Claw Pole

Alternator Incorporating the Rotor Motion

Dhouha Elloumi, Amina Ibala, Rabeb Rebhi, and Ahmed Masmoudi

Research Laboratory on Renewable Energies and Electric Vehicles
Sfax Engineering National School, P.O.Box1173, 3038 Sfax, Tunisia
Emails:elloumidouha@gmail.com.amina.ibala@gmail.com.rabeb_08@hotmail.fr.a.masmoudi@enis.rnu.tn

Abstract-The paper is devoted to the modeling of a
hybrid-excited claw pole alternator (HECPA) by means of
a variable position 3D magnetic equivalent circuit (MEC).
The study is initiated by the derivation of a MEC with the
rotor position kept at the maximum flux linkage between
the rotor and stator, enabling the investigation of the
steady-state features. The incorporation of the rotor posi­
tion in the MEC is then considered. A dedicated numerical
procedure based on the Newton-Raphson algorithm is de­
veloped for the resolution of the proposed variable position
MEC. The obtained fluxes, for the different considered
positions, allow the prediction of the HECPA time-varying
features under no-load operation. A comparison between
the results predicted by the variable position MEC and
those computed by finite element analysis reveals a good
agreement.
Keywords-Hybrid-excited claw pole alternator, magnetic
equivalent circuit, leakage flux, saturation, rotor position, air
gap flux density, phase flux linkage, back-EMF.
I. INTRODUCTION
Claw pole alternators (CPAs) are widely used as
generators in automotive applications thanks to their het­
eropolar topology of the rotor that enables the integration
of a high number of poles in a low volume. Nevertheless,
CPAs suffer from two major limitations: (i) the slip
ring system which penalizes the machine compactness
and reliability and (ii) a low efficiency [1], [2], [3].
Such drawbacks have motivated researches aimed at the
investigation of the capabilities exhibited by new CPA
concepts especially the hybrid-excited ones.
Magnetic equivalent circuit (MEC) based modeling
of CPAs represents a powerful CAD, sizing and analysis
tool that combines acceptable accuracy allied to reduced
CPU-time. It represents a state of the art topic which is
selected by different teams. Of particular interest is the
MEC modeling of hybrid-excited CPA (HECPAs) which
is presently given an increasing attention.
In [6], the output performance optimization of a hy­
brid excitation claw-pole alternator has been considered
using a three dimensional (3D) MEC taking the nonlinear
magnetic properties of iron into account. In addition,
the output performance have been optimized in terms of
the dimensions of the permanent magnets (PMs) using
a genetic algorithm. The nonlinear equations have been
solved using the Newton Rhapson algorithm.
In [7], Zhang et al. introduced the concept and oper­
ation principle of a claw pole motor with an outer rotor
equipped by surface-mounted PMs. The 3D no-load mag­
netic field distribution has been formulated considering
the scalar magnetic potential. This enabled the prediction
of the output power and efficiency characteristics of the
proposed concept at different power angle and speeds.
In [4], Rebhi et al. proposed a MEC model dedicated
to the sizing of a novel HECPA. It consists in a claw
pole concept with a NdFeB PM excitation in the rotor
and a DC one in the stator. The developed MEC has been
applied for the prediction of the no-load characteristic
and validated by 3D FEA. Then, the study has been
extended to the effect of given influent sizing parameters
on the machine back-EMF production capability. This
latter has been enhanced owing to the integration of two
ring ferrite PMs in the stator, along with a reduction of
the volume of the NdFeB PM in the rotor. This later has
been substituted by a ferrite PM in [5].
However, these models are restricted to the position
of maximum flux linkage between rotor and stator, that
enables an analysis limited to the steady-state charac­
teristics. In order to extend the analysis to the time­
varying features, the MEC has to be rethought with the
incorporation of the rotor position, yielding the so-called
"variable position MEC". The paper develops this idea
considering the concept proposed in [5].

978-1-4673-9529-8/15/$31.00 ©20151EEE
 II. HECPA CONCEPT DESCRIPTION
Fig. 1 shows an exploded view of the HECPA concept
proposed in [5]. It is basically a salient pole synchronous
machine which is equipped by two excitation sources:
(i) one achieved by three axially-magnetized ferrite
PMs suitably fixed on both stator and rotor, with:
o a cylindrical PM mounted on the rotor
core in between the claw plates,
o two cylindrical PMs mounted on the
magnetic collectors linked to the flasks.
(ii) a DC-current excitation achieved by two ring­
coils connected in series and located in the stator
between the stator yoke and the armature end
winding.
Fig. 1. Exploded view of the HECPA. Legend: CD Claw plate,
(6) Stator Ferrite PM, Q> Stator yoke, ® Armature winding, Gl Field
winding, @ Rotor ferrite PM, (!J Magnetic collector.
III. FLUX PATHS THROUGH THE HECPA
MAGNETIC CIRCUIT
The main flux flowing through the magnetic circuit
of the HECPA has two 3D paths such that:
• the first flux is induced by the rotor PM which
behaves as the field winding in the conven­
tional claw pole alternator. The flux flows axially
through the rotor PM, then crosses radially the
north claw plate as well as the claws. The flux
leaves the rotor through the radial air gap then
through the stator teeth where it splits circum­
ferentially into two paths in the stator laminated
yoke that circulate radially to join the adjacent
south claws. Then, they are concentrated radially
in the south plate then axially to close the path
within the rotor PM.
The above-described flux path is indicated in Fig.
2 by the white arrows,
• the second flux is induced by both stator excita­
tions:(i) the field and (ii) the lateral ferrite PMs.
The flux flows axially in the stator yoke then
radially and axially from the magnetic collector
to the north claws through the north PM and the
axial air gap. Then it crosses the radial air gap to
the stator teeth where it splits circumferentially
into two paths in the stator laminated yoke which
join the adjacent south claws through the stator
teeth and the radial air gap. Then, they cross the
axial air gap to the south PM and the magnetic
collector to return back to the stator yoke.
The above-described flux path is indicated in Fig.
2 by the black arrows.
Fig. 2. 3D paths of the main flux circulating through the HECPA
magnetic circuit.
IV. MAGNETIC EQUIVALENT CIRCUIT OF
THE HECPA
A. Main Flux Loops
The proposed MEC model, suitably adapted to the
rotor motion, is illustrated in Fig. 3 where:
• Resi, Rthi' Rsyi, Rrai, Re, Rpmi, Reol i, Rddg,
Rdg, Rd sg, Rnsgi, , Ryi indicate the reluctances
of the rotor section, the stator teeth, the stator
yoke, the air gap, the core, the permanent magnet,
the collector, the magnetic circuit immediately
behind the claw, the behind claw, magnetic circuit
immediately under the claw, the core under claw
and the yoke, respectively.
• Fde, Fpmi represents the MMFs generated by
the DC-current excitation in the stator and the
permanent magnet, respectively.
 Ry2
stator tooth
stator slot--+--+--+-+

RTi

rotor claw
subsurface

Fig. 4. Discretization of the claw surface within the median plane.

The major changes introduced in the MEC concern

the air gap and claw reluctances. Giving the geometry
of the HECPA under study, the discretization described
in Fig. 4, could lead to four or five subsurfaces per pole
according to the rotor position, such that:

R.,013 o the air gap is modeled by a network of seven

reluctances Rrai with the median plane of the
Rpm!
claw discretized into five subsurfaces. This case
is shown in Fig. 5, corresponding to B r =O°,
o the air gap is modeled by a network of six
Fig. 3. Variable position 3D MEC of the HECPA. Legend: (black) reluctances Rrai with the median plane of the
main flux loops, (red) leakage flux loops claw discretized into four subsurfaces. This case
is shown in Fig. 6, corresponding to B r =4 0•

B. Accounting for the Leakage Flux

In the manner of conventional claw pole machines,

much attention has been paid to the claw to claw leakage
flux reluctance Rcc. The reluctance RTLi refers to the
leakage flux circulating around a pair of adjacent slots.

The reluctances accounting for the leakage fluxes are

illustrated in red color in Fig. 3.

C. Accounting for the Rotor Motion

In one of the previous works dealing with a variable

position MEC of conventional CPAs [8], it has been
noticed that the rotor motion affects mainly the air gap
and claw reluctances. These have been updated according Fig. 5. Claw median plane discretization into five subsurfaces.
to the rotor position considering the following approach:

• the rotor claw surface within the median plane

is discretized into subsurfaces with their widthes
fixed by the stator slot-tooth limits. These are
shown by dashed lines in Fig. 4.
• each subsurface is modeled by a reluctance RTi.
• reluctances RTi are connected to the stator tooth
ones through the air gap reluctances Ragk . These
are characterizing two flux tubes, such that:
o one linking the claw subsurface with the
facing stator tooth,
o one linking the claw subsurface with the
facing teeth sides, as shown in Fig. 4. Fig. 6. Claw median plane discretization into four subsurfaces.
V. DERIVATION OF THE VARIABLE POSITION MEC Then, an iterative solver proceeds with the calculation
of the flux density in each branch as:
A. Problem Formulation
- <Pbr
The derivation of the variable position MEC is based B br -
(4)
Sbr
on the application of Kirchhoff's law for each loop
yielding a system of nonlinear equations, such that: where <Pbr and Sbr are the flux and the section of a given
branch.
(nlxnl) (nlxl) - F (nlxl)
AR 'PI 1
_

(1)
The B-H characteristic of each material enables the
where ARis a symmetric matrix composed of the MEC prediction of H( �)
and then the involved reluctances.
reluctances, 'PI is a vector of loop fluxes, F I is a vector Once the Jacobian J and matrix AR are updated, the
of MMF sources and nl is the number of loops. vector 'P is calculated as:
( ( )
The number of the air gap reluctances and loops are 'P(k+1) = 'P(k) - J(k))-l A� 'P(k) - F ) (5)
dependent of the rotor position. In general, AR has the
following form: The vector 'P(k+1) is considered to be the final
solution when the following condition is met:
Acol 0 0 0
(6)
(nsxns) (nsxna)(() )
0 Ast 0 Aag,st r
where the tolerance value c is a user-specified constant
AR (2)
(lxna)(() )
=
close to zero.
0 0 Art Aag,rt r
VI. PREDICTION OF THE STATIC AND THE TIME
� axna)(() )
0 Arg,st Arg,rt A� r VARYING FEATURES

where: Among the features that could be predicted following

the resolution of the position variable MEC, one can
• Acol, Ast and Art result from the magnetic col­
distinguish:
lector, stator and rotor loops,
1) the air gap flux density waveform,
• submatrices (Aag,st, Aag,rt et Aag) are rotor
2) the phase flux linkage waveform,
position dependent. Hence, they are updated for
3) the back-EMF waveform which is derived as:
each rotor position,
1
• subscripts st, rt, col and ag indicate the loop E = J2 Naw<pm (7)
fluxes in the stator teeth, in the rotor teeth, in the
magnetic collector and in the airgap, respectively, where N a is the number of turns per armature
phase, w is the angular frequency and <Pm is the
• subscripts ns and na indicate the number of flux linkage per phase assessed using the MEC.
stator teeth per pole and the number of airgap
loops per pole, respectively. A. Prediction of the No-Load Characteristic

B. MEC Resolution Prior the prediction of these time varying features, a

In the manner of the MEC model for a given rotor
position, the resolution of the variable position one is
carried out considering an iterative procedure based on
the Newton-Raphson algorithm [8].
The resolution of equation (1), for different rotor
positions, yields an initial vector of loop fluxes. Then,
in order to calculate the flux in a branch, an orientation
matrix ORis built, such that:
(3)
where nbr is the number of branches, 'Pbr is a vector of
branch fluxes and ORis an orientation matrix.
preliminary step consisting in checking the validity of the
proposed MEC for a given position has been considered.
It deals with the prediction of the no-load characteristic
applying equation (7). The obtained results are shown
in Fig. 7. A 3D FEA-based computation of the no-load
characteristic has been carried out and has led to the
results shown by dots in Fig. 7.
One can notice a good agreement between the MEC
and FEA results. Moreover, it is to be noted that the
magnetic circuit has a linear behavior in almost the whole
range of the considered field current If, except around
18A where it turns to be slightly saturated. Fig. 8 shows
the flux density mapping for If OA and If
= 18A.=
 30 ,-----�--�--_, B. Time Varying Feature Prediction

25 The resolution of the variable position MEC enabled

the prediction of the waveforms of:
u.. • the air gap flux density,
�I 15
.!< • the phase flux linkage,
U

o:ll
'"

• the phase back-EMF.

5
for a speed of 3000rpm and for three values of the field
10 15 current: If OA, If =6A and If= 18A. The obtained =

Field current (A)

Fig. 7. No-load characteristic for a speed of 3000rpm. Legend:
(continuous line) static MEC results, (dots) FEA results.
results are illustrated in Figs. 9, 10 and 11, respectively.
These figures include the features computed by 3D FEA.
One can notice a quite acceptable correlation between the
MEC and FEA results.

Shaded Plot
181 s moothed
I:Oms
2.5
2
1.5
- 1
0.5
- 0

o 0.5 1.5 2 2.5

Time (ms)

(a)
(a)
0. 8 ,------�--�____;

2.5
2
1.5
1
G.5
G

-
0.8
0 1.5 2
Time (ms)

(b)
1.5

(b)

Fig. 8. 3D FEA based investigation of the flux density map­ E

0.5
ping through the HECPA magnetic circuit. Legend: (a) If OA,
= .�
§
(b) If= 18A. "
� a
c
"

� -O.5

:;;:
-I
Referring to Fig. 8, it clearly appears that the mag­
netic circuit is far from being saturated for If OA =
-1.5
0 1.5 2
with a maximum flux density no exceeding O.9T in the Time (ms)
stator teeth. However, for If 18A, the major part of
=
(c)
the magnetic circuit turns to be saturated especially the
Fig. 9. No-load air gap flux density waveforms for a speed of
stator teeth and yoke as well as the magnetic collectors 3000rpm. Legend 1: (a) If OA, (b) If
= 6A, (c) If 18A.
= =

where the flux density is ranging between 1.5T and 2.1T. Legend 2: continuous line: MEC results,interrupted line: FEA results.
 -3
x to
2

-10

2 -15 '-----'-----�-�-�-�-�--"
- 0'----
- O.L.S---'----'-I.-
S ----'2-----"
2.-S --3'------'
- o 0.5 1.5 2 2.5
Time (ms) Time (ms)

(a) (a)

2.5
- 0---
'- 0..L5-�---'- 2 ---'-
1.5---'- 2.5-----'----' -25
0 0.5 1.5 2 2.5
-

Time (ms)
Time (ms)
(b)
(b)
40

-3

- '----�'------L--l�.5---'-2------
� ' ----"'----�
Time (ms) 0.5 1.5 2 2.5
Time (ms)
(c)
(c)
Fig. 10. No-load phase flux linkage waveforms for a speed of
Fig. 11. Phase back-EMF waveforms for a speed of 3000rpm.
3000rpm. Legend 1: (a) If OA, (b) If
= 6A, (c) If
= 18A. =

Legend 1: (a) If OA, (b) If 6A, (c) If 18A. Legend 2:

Legend 2: continuous line: MEC results,interrupted line: FEA results.
= = =

continuous line: MEC results, interrupted line: FEA results.

VII. CONCLUSION

The paper was aimed at the 3D magnetic equivalent
circuit (MEC) modeling of a hybrid-excited claw pole
alternator (HECPA), with the leakage flux, the magnetic
saturation and the rotor position variation taken into
account. A preliminary step consisting in checking the
validity of the proposed MEC for a given rotor position
has been considered. Indeed, the MEC model of the
HECPA has been derived with the rotor position kept
at the maximum flux linkage between rotor and stator,
that enabled the prediction of the no-load characteristic.
The incorporation of the rotor position in the MEC
has been in an advanced step. A dedicated numerical
procedure based on the Newton-Raphson algorithm has
been developed for the resolution of the variable position
MEC. The obtained fluxes, for the different considered
positions, allow the prediction of the HECPA time­
varying features under no-load operation. A comparison
between the results predicted by the proposed variable
position MEC and those computed by 3D FEA has
revealed a good agreement.
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