ISSN 1068-3712, Russian Electrical Engineering, 2007, Vol. 78, No. 8, pp. 395–402. © Allerton Press, Inc., 2007.

Original Russian Text © A.V. Ivanov-Smolenskii, V.A. Kuznetsov, D.A. Petrichenko, 2007, published in Elektrotekhnika, 2007, No. 8, pp. 4–12.

Developing a Combined Method for Analysis of Electric Machines

A. V. Ivanov-Smolenskiia, V. A. Kuznetsova, and D. A. Petrichenkob
a Moscow Institute of Power Engineering
b L’Ecole Centrale de Lille

Abstract—A combined method for the simulation of magnetic fields, characteristics, and processes in electric
machines (EMs) is developed that is based on a new type of equivalent electromagnetic circuit. The new method
combines calculations of the magnetic fields in local zones of an EM with numerical simulation of the discrete
structure of that EM. An approach to the simulation of the 3D magnetic field of an EM whose core is charac-
terized by axial nonuniformity is proposed
DOI: 10.3103/S1068371207080019

Over the last 100–120 years, electric machines and
the equipment that is electrically connected to them
remain key elements of the unparalleled acceleration of
technological progress. The development of electrical
mechanics and the entire set of activities of mankind in
the area of electricity and electric power have ensured,
facilitated, and boosted the successful development of
the overwhelming number of the knowledge areas
whose list alone would be too long for this publication.
The electric machine (EM), regardless of its func-
tions in an electromechanical system, comprises the
core of such a system and the entity whose description
is quite difficult. The machine itself may be considered
a complex system that incorporates electromagnetic,
electric, wave, vibration, and mechanical, as well as
thermal, hydro- and aerodynamic, phenomena. As a
result of this richness of interrelated, albeit to varying
degrees, phenomena in the EM, which are additionally
complicated by nonlinearities of different types, special
attention is paid to the development of advanced mod-
els of the EM.
Construction of comprehensive and fully adequate
mathematical models of the EM is a problem that
hardly may be solved in the nearest future due to
extremely high dimensionality of the described object.
The large number of dimensions is related to the huge
number of the elements involved in analysis, as well as
to the uncertainty and inadequacy of their characteris-
tics.
It is known that the mathematical description of the
characteristics and parameters of an EM may be
derived from the solution of Maxwell differential equa-
tions for the magnetic and electric media in the EM,
which may be represented in integral form. The diffi-
culties in the transformation of the equations for the
EM to the integral form are related to [1] the following:
• geometrically complex boundaries of ferromag-
netic bodies in the EM;
• continuous variation of the nonmagnetic space
between immobile and movable (rotating) bodies in the
EM that have tooth-like and, often, irregular structures;
• 3D character of the magnetic fields in the EM in
the case of the axial nonuniformity of the structures on
ferromagnetic media in the EM, etc.
To implement analytical and graphical methods for
the calculation of the magnetic field in an EM that takes
nonlinearities into account, at the initial stage of the
development of electrical mechanics, Russian and for-
eign specialists have proposed a broad set of rather
inventive assumptions based on the concept of diacop-
tics. In this way, a transition was made from the
description of electromagnetic fields in ferromagnetic
media and air to their discrete analog in the form of
electric and magnetic circuits. This step underlies the
major part of the techniques and the calculation log-
books that are still used by plants that manufacture
electric machines. Although the methods for the elec-
tromagnetic calculation of an EM that were developed
before the 1950s are based on rather arbitrary assump-
tions and mismatch the capacities of rapidly developing
computer facilities, they are still widely applied in cal-
culations when even key power EMs are designed. This
situation is possible because specialists in electrical
mechanics conceptually defined a combined calcula-
tion method that incorporates the discrete presentation
of an EM as a set of electric and magnetic circuits,
which may be easily studied using electric engineering
methods, and the detailed calculations of magnetic
fields in local areas. These calculations may be per-
formed correctly with the boundary conditions for a
magnetic field, which should be set in a substantiated
way; it does not always stand that the solution to this
problem may be found easily. The gaps between the
rotating and immobile parts of an EM, slot volumes,
front part zones, tooth and yoke parts of cores, etc. are
most often selected as local areas. Setting boundary
conditions is a problem that is often criticized as not
corresponding to the actual state of the magnetic field

395
396 IVANOV-SMOLENSKII et al.
in the studied area. The determination of the magnetic
field in the slot zone and, consequentially, the calcula-
tion of slot leakage may be chosen as an example. This
parameter is usually calculated for antisymmetric odd
boundary conditions. Actually, it is almost always the
case that the boundary conditions for an excited slot are
asymmetric and have an individual character for each
slot through which a current flows [1].
Numerical, rather than analytic, methods have
begun to be developed as a result of dissatisfaction with
the accuracy of approximate computations of the mag-
netic field with boundary conditions that are set without
sufficient substantiation with the local approach to the
determination of magnetic fields. Moreover, high per-
formance computers began to be rapidly developed in
the mid-twentieth century. The universality, flexibility,
and the short time with which results could be obtained
by applying numerical methods (NMs) were so attrac-
tive for different areas of science and engineering that
after a short period of time, NMs began to dominate in
engineering calculations. NMs became even more
attractive owing to the well-developed mathematical
basis, the possibility to solve problems for essentially
nonlinear media (this feature is of especial importance
for EMs), the representation of the obtained results in
an easily comprehensible form, and the incorporation
of user-friendly supplementary tools. The success of
the use of NMs for EMs was predetermined by the
experience in engineering that was garnered over doz-
ens of years and the relatively simple nature of phe-
nomenologically interpreted laws of electrical mechan-
ics in the ranges of velocities, powers, and voltages (in
both the electric and mechanical areas) that are typical
of EMs. Owing to this specific feature of developed
EMs, it was possible to significantly simplify the proce-
dure employed for optimizing the EM structure.
One more advantage of NMs is the capacity to han-
dle actual instantaneous values of amperages, voltages,
magnetic inductions, fluxes, etc., thus enabling the
researcher to abandon such artificial approaches as, for
example, the transformation of the coordinate frame,
the operator and symbolic method, the conformal map-
ping method, linearization, etc. Currently, dozens of
numerical methods and programs are available that
have been used successfully during last 30–35 years
[2]. As a result of the global offensive of computer-
based NMs of calculations on electrical mechanics,
researchers and engineers began to experience the
euphoric feeling that they now feel; in a sense, these
changes constitute an “absolute weapon” that enables
them to simulate magnetic fields and processes in elec-
trical mechanics with high accuracy. Unfortunately,
however, this is not always the case.
The object of studies in an EM is a set of interacting,
mutually relocating, geometrically complex, nonuni-
form media that conducts electricity, is nonlinear with
respect to magnetic effects, is characterized by large
RUSSIAN ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING
gradients of magnetic fields, and involves thermal,
hydraulic, vibration, and mechanical processes.
The experience of the numerical simulation of EMs
and electromechanical systems (EMS) shows that the
magnetic fields in EMs are calculated in the most effi-
cient way by numerical techniques using the finite-ele-
ment method (FEM). Commercial programs such as
ELCUT, ANSYS, MAXWELL, FEMME, FLUX,
OPERA, etc., as well as proprietary software, are
widely used for calculations. If the FEM is used, the
internal space of an EM is divided into very fine ele-
ments. The number of nodes, even if a finite-element
mesh with a variable density is used, amounts to dozens
of hundreds, or may even exceed a million. This
approach allows one to determine the distribution of the
induction in both ferromagnetic and air and current-
conducting media with a high accuracy. A specific fea-
ture of the EM structure consists of a significant differ-
ence between the dimensions of separated areas. The
air gap between the rotor and the stator has minimal
dimensions; however, this area is characterized by sig-
nificant induction. The requirements set for the accu-
racy of calculations of the field in the gap are highly
stringent; thus, a very fine mesh should be used in this
area. As a result, the total number of nodes increases,
although the field gradients in other areas are essen-
tially smaller and do not require such detailed calcula-
tions. Therefore, the redundant information about the
values of the field in a number of local areas located far
from the main zone where energy is converted requires
the computer memory to be increased without reason-
able reasons and adversely affects the computation
time. For example, to calculate characteristics of the
idle run of a turbine generator manufactured by Jeu-
mont–Framatome by means of the OPERA 2D pro-
gram taking rotation into account, a modern computer
(Pentium IV, 2400 MHz, 2GB RAM) needs to be run
for 3 h 20 min.
The redundancy of information provided by a
straightforward approach to the use of the FEM was a
reason for the development of hybrid, combined mod-
els of magnetic fields in EMs that combine the advan-
tages of the analytic and numerical methods for the
analysis of magnetic fields and detailed discrete equiv-
alent schemes and a comparatively small number of
elements reproducing magnetic fluxes in EM elements.
This approach provides an opportunity to reproduce the
rotor rotation without conceptual complications in the
calculation scheme and, in addition, this possibility
may be implemented in a comparatively easy way.
A second positive feature is that one can simulate
the flux linkage of windings taking into account the 3D
structure of their cores within a 2D reproduction of the
transverse magnetic field of an EM [3].
The first attempts to develop EM models reproduc-
ing the magnetic fields of machines, their characteris-
tics, and the processes that concurrently apply the
methods of physical and mathematical simulation were
Vol. 78 No. 8 2007