Development and Investigation of Novel Axial-Field Dual-Rotor Segmented Switched Reluctance Machine

This article presents a new type of axial-field switched reluctance machine (AFSRM) and axial-field dual-rotor segmented switched reluctance machine (ADS-SRM), along with its design methodology. The proposed ADS-SRM is featured by the segmental stator and rotor poles, the auxiliary flux-conductive rings, and the concentrated windings. The yokeless topology reduces the active length of the motor. Besides, the adopted short-end winding layout increases the slot-fill factor and the motor's reliability. First, the basic topology of ADS-SRM is introduced along with its operating principle and various stator/rotor pole combinations. The three-phase 12/8 configuration of ADS-SRM is chosen for further analysis. Then, the design methodology considering the fringing and leakage field effects through the magnetic equivalent circuit (MEC) method is developed, and the flowchart detailing the design procedure is presented. Through the comparison with the conventional yokeless and segmented armature (YASA) topology, ADS-SRM exhibits excellent performance at overload conditions. The prototype is designed and fabricated, and the experimental results verify the motor performance.