Characteristics comparison between air-cored and iron-cored 100 kW HTS field winding synchronous motors

Abstract

This paper presents comparative research on characteristics of air-cored and iron-cored high-temperature superconductor (HTS) field winding synchronous motors. The 100 kW air-cored model is designed analytically by Spatial Harmonic Method, and based on this model, the iron-cored model having the same output power is designed for comparison. Due to the substantial difference of permeability property between air and iron-core, there is a difference of magnetic field magnitude and angle with respect to the HTS tape c-axis, resulting in a different critical current of the field winding considering the anisotropic property of HTS tape. For a detailed comparison between two models, the following key motor characteristics are calculated through the Finite Element Method (FEM) simulation: 1) critical current; 2) HTS wire length; and 3) torque characteristics. From the simulation results, it can be confirmed that the critical current value of the iron-cored model increases by 33 %. Also, in the case of the superconducting wire consumption, those of the iron-cored and air-cored models are 95.3 m and 815.6 m, respectively. So the wire usage can be reduced to about 88 % by using iron core. However, in terms of torque characteristics, the torque ripple of the iron-cored model is about twice as large as that of the air-cored model, which may be a disadvantage on vibration and acoustic noise.