Calculation of Cogging Torque in Squirrel-Cage Induction Motors

Wang Xun, Qiu Ariu

State Key Lab of Power Systems, Department of Electrical Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China E-mail:xun-wang05@mails.tsinghua.edu.cn
Abstract This paper presents the analytical method and finite element method(FEM) for calculation of cogging torque in squirrel-cage induction motors. The analytical method is based on inductance coefficient and permeance wave technique, taking into account effects of slotting, saturation and winding connections. Based on finite element method, classical Maxwell stress method, modified Maxwell stress method and virtual work method are used to calculate cogging torque. Calculation results obtained by the analytical method and those obtained by finite element method are compared. The results reveal that the three methods in FEM give approximately the same results and FEM is better than the analytical method in calculating cogging torque.

non-skewed machine. Table I shows specifications of the squirrel-cage induction motor.

TABLE I SPECIFICATIONS OF A SQUIRREL-CAGE INDUCTION MOTOR ITEM Pole pairs Number of phases Stator winding connection Stator winding layout Outer diameter of stator Inner diameter of stator Number of stator slot Parallel branch number of stator Air gap length Inner diameter of rotor Number of rotor slot Value (unit) 2 3 double layer 290 (mm) 187 (mm) 48 2 5.5 (mm) 70 (mm) 44

I. INTRODUCTION Any unwanted torque variations with position, due to variations in air gap geometry, have been regarded as cogging torques. A high cogging torque can provoke vibration and noise in induction motors and a sufficiently high cogging torque can cause the electrical machines to lock in a standstill position. Often cogging torque can be reduced significantly by a proper slot combination in squirrel-cage induction motors. Permeance wave method[1,2] was applied to determine harmonic air gap magnetic density and analytical expressions for the pulsating torques. Conformal transformation[3] was applied to calculate air gap field and cogging torque in squirrel-cage induction motors. To accurately calculate electromagnetic torque, finite element method(FEM) has been applied to a variety of electrical machines, including induction machine[4] and permanent magnet machine[5,6]. In this paper, cogging torque calculations are performed by using both analytical and finite element method. Firstly, the analytical method is based on permeance wave and inductance coefficients, in which effects of slotting, saturation and winding connections are considered. The single coil is taken as the fundamental unit to study electromagnetic relationship. Then, classical Maxwell stress method, modified Maxwell stress method, and virtual work method on the basis of FEM are applied to calculate torque. Finally, the calculated results obtained from those methods are compared and the conclusions are given in the end of this paper.
II. TORQUE CALCULATION OF ANALYTICAL METHOD

Before electromagnetic torque is calculated, inductances and currents must be firstly calculated. Slotting and saturation are often neglected when inductances and currents are calculated[7]. The analytical expressions for phase winding inductances or loop inductances become complicated when effects of slotting and saturation are considered. In this paper, the single coil is taken as the fundamental unit to calculate inductance. The analytical expressions for the self inductance of single coil and the mutual inductance between coils are derived respectively. The loop inductance can be obtained by means of the self inductance of single coil and the mutual inductance between coils. Permeance coefficient of an air gap with bilateral slotting[8] can be expressed by strt ( , t ) 01st ( ) rt ( , t ) (1)

The main sources of harmonic fields in the air gap of the squirrel-cage induction motor are stator and rotor slotting, saturation and winding concentration. For these reasons, cogging torque may be produced in improper design. To avoid high vibration and noise, cogging torque should be reduced in the design stage. Skewing can reduce cogging but lead to a higher loss, so the high voltage medium-sized and large-sized induction motors are often non-skewed. The effect of skew is not considered in this paper. The squirrel-cage induction motor used in this paper is a

where st ( ) is permeance coefficient of an air gap with a slotted stator and smooth rotor, rt ( ,t ) is permeance coefficient of an air gap with a slotted rotor and smooth stator, 0 = 0 , is the constant air gap between a smooth stator and a smooth rotor. Saturation occurs in the teeth and yoke of the stator and rotor. In this paper, the approach is that the reluctance in the iron is neglected and the air gap is magnified by a fictitious amount to consider the reluctance in the iron. So a general air gap with smooth air gap and saturation is expressed as[9]
sa ( , t ) = sa,0 + sa, n cos 2n (1t P + sa,0 )
n =1

(2)

where sa,n may be calculated by relationship between the magnetization of the teeth, yoke and air gap[10], 1 is the angular frequency of the fundamental component of phase current, and P is the pole pairs. Permeance coefficient with respect to saturation is written

as
0 (3) sa ( , t ) = sa ( , t ) So permeance coefficient of an air gap with bilateral slotting and saturation may be expressed as ( , t ) 01strt ( , t ) sa ( , t ) (4)

where l is the loop current vector and L is the mutual inductance coefficient matrix between loops in both stator and rotor. l and L are matrices of the form, i.e., l = isl,1 " isl, Nsl
and

irl,1 " irl, N rl

The general expression of mutual inductance coefficient between two coils A and B is given by
M BA =

BA
iA

wc B ( , t ) ds
s2 s1

iA

wc Fc ( ) ( , t ) ds
s2 s1

iA

(5)

where BA is the flux-linkage, B ( , t ) is the flux density, Fc ( ) is MMF of the coil, and wc is turn number of the coil. The self inductance of single stator coil, mutual inductance between stator coils, self inductance of single rotor loop, mutual inductance between rotor loops, and mutual inductance between stator coil and rotor loop can be obtained by the above derivations. Selected loops in the rotor are shown in Fig. 1.

M slrl M L = slslT . M slrl M rlrl Based on the virtual displacement principle when each loop current is kept as constant, the electromagnetic torque is expressed as Wm 1 T L = l l (9) Tem ( t ) = 2 where is the mechanical angular position of the rotor. As shown in Fig. 3, cogging torque for the prescribed machine whose specifications are illustrated in Table I is large since the difference for this machine between the number of stator slot and that of rotor slot is multiple of pole number[3].

Fig. 1. Sketch map of rotor loops

Selected loops in the stator are shown in Fig. 2. The inductance coefficient between stator loops can be given by T M slsl = H scsl M scsc H scsl (6) where M scsc is the mutual inductance coefficient matrix of stator coils, H scsl is the transformation matrix between stator coils and stator loops.

Fig. 3. Torque calculated by the analytical method

In squirrel-cage induction motor, slotting harmonic and saturation harmonic are major components of harmonic air gap magnetic density. When self and mutual inductances are calculated, the analytical expression of air gap permeance coefficient, i.e. the permeance of unit area, includes harmonic components due to effects of slotting and saturation. So cogging torque varying with rotor position may be properly predicted.
III. TORQUE CALCULATION OF FEM

Fig. 2. Sketch map of stator loops

The inductance coefficient matrix between stator loops and rotor loops can be expressed by M slrl = H T M scrl (7) scsl where M scrl is the inductance coefficient matrix between stator coils and rotor loops. With self and mutual inductance coefficients of loops, one can write flux-linkage equations and voltage equations. By means of resolving voltage equations, loop currents in steady state may be obtained[11]. In electrical machine, magnetic co-energy is equal to the stored energy, i.e., 1 Wm = lT L l (8) 2

The field-circuit coupled time-stepping finite element method(FEM) is an effective method to accurately calculate electromagnetic torque. Torque can be calculated by using both Maxwell stress method and virtual work method. Comparison is performed between the torque values calculated by Maxwell stress method and those obtained by virtual work method in this paper. To accurately calculate air gap flux density, the number of element in air gap region should be large and there are five layers of elements across the air gap. In order to consider rotor movement and prevent elements to be overly distorted, only air gap center element layer is remeshed and others air gap element layer are fixed. Mesh of the air gap is shown in Fig. 4. Maxwell stress method uses both radial and tangential components of the air gap flux density to calculate torque. The tangential magnetic force is integrated around the surface of the air gap. So electromagnetic torque is expressed by 1 Tem = r t ds = r Br Bt ds (10) 0 s s

where t is the tangential magnetic force, Br is the radial flux density, Bt is the tangential flux density, and r is the radius of circular path selected.

stress method are shown in Fig. 8. In practice, there is a small difference among torques calculated in different air gap layer.
Torque (N m) Torque (N m) (b) air gap layer close to rotor Torque (N m)

Fig. 4. Mesh of the air gap

From the equation above, electromagnetic torque is the total of tangential magnetic force which is related with radial flux density and tangential flux density. Air gap magnetic field influences electromagnetic torque. For the squirrel-cage induction motor described in Table I, space distribution of radial flux density is shown in Fig. 5, space distribution of tangential flux density is demonstrated in Fig. 6, and space distribution of tangential magnetic force is illustrated in Fig. 7.

(a) air gap center layer Torque (N m)

(c) air gap layer close to stator (d) mean of all air gap layers Fig. 8. Torque calculated by classical Maxwell stress method

Fig. 5. Space distribution of radial flux density

As the accuracy of torque calculation from the Maxwell stress tensor method relies on model discretization and contour selection, the classical Maxwell stress tensor method has been modified to try to improve its precision[12]. Electromagnetic torque is calculated by yielding an area integration which takes into account the field distribution in the air gap of a machine, in order to eliminate the sensitivity to contour selection. For a two-dimensional Cartesian problem, the electromagnetic torque is calculated by summing the product of radial and tangential flux density over all the elements within the air gap. So electromagnetic torque is evaluated by[12] L N ( Bx xc,e + By yc,e )( By xc, e Bx yc,e ) Tem = fe Se (12) 2 2 0 e =1 xc,e + yc, e where Bx and By are flux density components in x- and ydirection, xc,e and yc, e are the coordinates of the center of an element, Se is the area of an element, and N is the number of elements in the air gap. In order to compare with classical Maxwell stress method, electromagnetic torques of different air gap layer are computed by modified Maxwell stress method. Cogging torques are shown in Fig. 9. For virtual work method, the tangential force is derived for each node by direct differentiation of the stored magnetic energy of the finite elements surrounding the node with

Fig. 6. Space distribution of tangential flux density Tangential force (105Pa) Fig. 7. Space distribution of tangential magnetic force

In the two-dimensional model, the integration path is set at a circle of radius r at the center of the air gap layer. So electromagnetic torque is be given by L 2 Tem = fe r 2 Br Bt d (11)

respect to the tangentially virtual displacement while keeping the magnetic potential constant. As element shape of air gap center element layer is only change in this paper, the tangential force in air gap center element layer is only calculated. The total force in the tangential direction is W Tem ( t ) = m

where Lfe is the iron length. Ideally, Maxwell stress method does not depend upon the path taken. Cogging torques calculated by classical Maxwell

(13)

where Wm is the stored magnetic energy, is the mechanical angular position of the rotor, and flux linkage is kept as constant.
Torque (N m)

It is better to use the mean value of electromagnetic torque in all air gap element layers. So it is concluded that the calculation accuracy of torque only depends on the accuracy of electromagnetic fields. Enough elements should be used in the air gap to properly compute the electromagnetic torque by FEM. It is seems that the modified Maxwell stress method does not greatly improve the precision of torque calculation.
V.

CONCLUSION

(a) air gap center layer Torque (N m)

(b) air gap layer close to rotor Torque (N m)

(c) air gap layer close to stator

(d) the whole air gap

For calculation of cogging torque, two methods including the analytical method and FEM are discussed and compared in this paper. Torque value calculated by Maxwell stress method is nearly as same as that calculated by virtual work method. Cogging torque can be properly calculated by the analytical method in which slotting and saturation are taken into account, but the accuracy of cogging torque calculation of the analytical method is less than that of FEM. Analytical method is simple and requires small time consumption. FEM is accurate but huge time consumption is required, especially for medium-sized and large-sized asynchronous motors.
VI. [1]

Fig. 9. Torque calculated by modified Maxwell stress method

In air gap center element layer, the stored magnetic energy is

Ne Ne B2 HdB dV = Lfe Wm,e = Lfe e e e (14) V 0 2 e =1 e =1 where N e is the number of element in air gap center layer, e is the reluctivity of element e , Be is the flux density of element e , and e is the area of element e . Be can be described with radius and angular dimension of the node of element in air gap center layer[13]. So the electromagnetic torque can be calculated with equations (13) and (14). Cogging torque of air gap center layer calculated by virtual work method is shown in Fig. 10.

REFERENCES

Wm =

[2]

[3] [4]

[5]

[6]

15 10 5 0 -5 -10 0 2 4 6 8 10

[7]

[8] [9]

Time (ms) Fig. 10. Torque of air gap center layer by virtual work method IV.

[10] [11] [12]

COMPARISON OF RESULTS

From Fig. 3, cogging torque obtained by the analytical method is not very accurate. The reasons may be that the analytical method is a simplified method for air gap field calculation. Tangential flux density is neglected in the analytical method. But the oscillation periodicity of cogging torque calculated by the analytical method is as same as one of cogging torque calculated by FEM. From calculation results above, shown as Fig. 8-10, cogging torques calculated by classical Maxwell stress method, modified Maxwell stress method and virtual work method in the air gap element layer are nearly same. There is a small difference among torques calculated in different air gap layer.

[13]

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