Quantitative Comparison of Vernier Permanent-Magnet Motors with Interior Permanent-Magnet Motor for Hybrid Electric Vehicles

Abstract

In this paper, three Vernier permanent-magnet (VPM) motor, namely the inner-rotor VPM (IR-VPM) motor, the outer-rotor VPM (OR-VPM) motor and the OR consequent-pole VPM (OR-CP-VPM) motor are proposed for the hybrid electric vehicle (HEV) applications. Owing to employment of toroidal-winding arrangement, the OR-VPM and the OR-CP-VPM motors can enjoy better material utilization and easier manufacturing process than its IR-VPM counterpart. Meanwhile the OR-CP-VPM motor can utilize the consequent-pole topology to minimize flux leakage that exists in conventional design. With the support of finite element method (FEM), the motor performances among the VPM motors and the profound interior permanent-magnet (IPM) motor can be compared quantitatively.