Future of Electric Motors

[dArsonval]

As everyone here enjoys solving "electrical problems"... Can I rear the ugly old question of... "What's Next"?

What's going on in this ever changing industry that we... as (Electrical People) need to be ready for.

What are you working on? What's next?
Any "heads up"?

John

 

[Skogsgurra]

There were rumours that ABB was working on a new DC motor concept. Far from what has been known so far and expanding the envelope in many directions. But not sure if that survives the Baldor incident.

Gunnar Englund

http://www.gke.org

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Half full - Half empty? I don't mind. It's what in it that counts.

 

[waross]

Baldor incident??


Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter

 

[Skogsgurra]

ABB bought Baldor. It looks like development is moving from Västerås to Baldor territory.

Gunnar Englund

http://www.gke.org

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Half full - Half empty? I don't mind. It's what in it that counts.

 

[waross]

Thank you Skogs.
Yours
Bill

Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter

 

[electricpete]

On-line condition "partial discharge" monitoring using coupling capacitors or slot couplers is relatively new in the past 15 years or so. That's about the only thing "new" to hit my plant.

Switched reluctance motors was the old "new thing" that never really exploded the way some people thought it would. There was a thread on that in the past.

We have heard lots of talk of magnetic bearings and superconducting windings for awhile... I haven't seen any find their way to manufacturer's offerings when we've bought motors recently.... I guess the high tech sexy stuff is reserved for special applications with space/weight constraints that justify the cost. Maybe shop people get involved in a wider variety of motors. I'd be interested to hear about the unique new motors that show up in repair shops.


=====================================
(2B)+(2B)' ?

 

[KllrWolf]

The latest and greatest for my tiny segment is just an increase in larger horsepower motors than previously built, and the use in either colder or hotter ambient conditions than normal.

 

[Skogsgurra]

Magnetic bearings and superconductors is something I heard about when I started at ASEA/ABB HQ in the sixties. As Pete says, it has been the "news" for a long time. SKF and others have magnetic bearings. But for specialized machines only. Are there any superconducting motor/generator windings out there?

Gunnar Englund

http://www.gke.org

--------------------------------------
Half full - Half empty? I don't mind. It's what in it that counts.

 

[powerjunx]

ABB bought Baldor?? when was that skog? superconducting - cryogenic-cooled winding perhaps?


"..the more, the merrier" Genghis Khan

 

[Skogsgurra]

http://www.abb.com/cawp/seitp202/9382d7f5d76f92c8c12577e700509d84.aspx

Yes, supercooled windings. There were tests running in Västerås in the sixties.

Gunnar Englund

http://www.gke.org

--------------------------------------
Half full - Half empty? I don't mind. It's what in it that counts.

 

[powerjunx]

thnx skog for the link..Baldor is about to sink.
hope i see one supercoducting machine in the industry, somewhere out there.



"..the more, the merrier" Genghis Khan

 

[Motorwinder]

We've been working on some permanent magnet motors that seems to be the future.

A nightmare to work on though. Litz wire, high frequency, very little insulation for what we have to test them to. Lots of ground faults.

Link

 

[Skogsgurra]

Not only that, Motorwinder, you also need a clean-room. I had several PM motors in a paper machine where the bearings were destroyed by PWM stray currents. It was not possible to change bearings on site because iron filings and dust was attracted to the poles and couldn't be removed once it got there. Had to bring them to the manufacturer's site. These motors were between 200 and a little more than 1000 kW. Distance between paper machine and manufacturer's site was 1 854 km - one way. Took a truck more than three days to make the round trip - bearings were changed in a few hours.

Permanent magnet motors are not always the best solution.

Gunnar Englund

http://www.gke.org

--------------------------------------
Half full - Half empty? I don't mind. It's what in it that counts.

 

[LiteYear]

Still on the motor theme, one big thing on the horizon for us is effective sinusoidal filtering of variable speed drives. As Skogsgurra says, PWM stray currents can be destructive and filtering is one solution - the current batch of filtering technology on the market have various trade-offs that depending on the application can cause more dramas than they solve. Newer designs - NFO Sinus, current-source topologies, etc., could have a huge impact if they scale well.

On the electronics design front, Functional Safety design is a lumbering elephant on the horizon. Perhaps already pervasive in aviation and automotive, "Proven" operating systems, redundant architectures, voting systems, quantitative FMEA, formal specification languages, all have the potential of fundamentally changing the way we operate.

And on the silicon level, massively parallel architectures will be one of the next big things - chips are already being manufactured with hundreds of parallel processing cores, but the software and algorithms to get the most out of them is still playing catch-up. As we approach physical limits in clock speeds, parallelism will be the next way forward.

 

[LiteYear]

Aw crap, just re-read the subject. You specifically were referring to motors. Oh well, ignore the last two items!

 

[Motorwinder]

Not only that, Motorwinder, you also need a clean-room. I had several PM motors in a paper machine where the bearings were destroyed by PWM stray currents. It was not possible to change bearings on site because iron filings and dust was attracted to the poles and couldn't be removed once it got there. Had to bring them to the manufacturer's site. These motors were between 200 and a little more than 1000 kW. Distance between paper machine and manufacturer's site was 1 854 km - one way. Took a truck more than three days to make the round trip - bearings were changed in a few hours.

Permanent magnet motors are not always the best solution.

We were lucky and got stators only. I wouldn't want any part of that rotor.

 

[Skogsgurra]

LiteYear

I think that the combination drive/motor is important. So, your posts are relevant. You mention the NFO Sinus, and I have been working with the late Ragnar Jonsson. I regret that he passed away a couple of months ago in the midst of testing a modular multi-phase system that can easily be scaled upwards by parallelling modules. The Switch Circuit is inherently a current source and load sharing is extremely well-controlled. The interference-free operation of the Switch Circuit and the excellent torque behaviour at low speeds are the main benefits of that type of a drive.

Ragnars idea was to parallel four modules to form a "plank" that is good for around 50 kW. Four such planks can be combined to form a "square" that delivers 200 kW and four such squares build a "cube" that can deliver 800 kW. Of course, more squares can be added to form 1000 and 1200 kW units.

I think that future drive systems may be built using principles like that. The modularity makes massive use of low-power components, which keeps cost low, and all drives will use the same components, regardless of rated output power so that one-size spare parts fit all drive sizes. Redundancy is inherent and a faulty module can be automatically isolated and then hot swapped.


Gunnar Englund

http://www.gke.org

--------------------------------------
Half full - Half empty? I don't mind. It's what in it that counts.

 

[cranky108]

Is that it, all down to reducing Friction, winding, and core losses? Nothing new here, except how to do it and cost.

Has anyone tried using something other than AIR for cooling, and to reduce wind losses? Maybe something like Hydrogen. They already do that for large generators, and have for over 50 years.
But it hasen't tranlated to smaller motors or generators.

I think any changes will come down to cost, and value (savings). Variable speed drives is a big step for motors that may not be fully loaded, and are cost competive for motor starters (I haven't priced any, but from what I hear).

I once thought thermoelectric chips would be a big thing, but turns out they are also big energy hogs.

 

[OperaHouse]

I know what didn't happen, not yet anyway. I was working at a corporate R&D center about 30 years ago and heard of a project. Instead of winding motor coils they were going to shoot in sections of wire and just weld the ends. So every motor would have like a thousand little welds. It was one of those blue sky projects trying to bring robotics into motor manufacture. Never followed it.

 

[Clyde38]

How about the "Iron Nitride Permanent Magnet, Alternative to Rare Earth and Neodymium Magnets"? If this works out there will be some interesting results for the motors and actuators that use permanent magnets. . .

http://www.license.umn.edu/Products...re-Earth-and-Neodymium-Magnets__20120016.aspx