IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MAGNETICS, VOL. 43, NO.

6, JUNE 2007 2531

Optimization of the Magnetic Pole Shape of a Permanent-Magnet

Synchronous Motor
Ping Zheng, Jing Zhao, Jianqun Han, Jie Wang, Zhiyuan Yao, and Ranran Liu

Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, 150001, China

A kind of six-slot/four-pole permanent-magnet (PM) synchronous motor is very popular nowadays for the advantages of saving cop-
pers and because it is easy to manufacture. The magnetomotive force (MMF) produced by the six-slot stator windings are not symmetrical
under the four poles, and more harmonics exist in the air gap, which will increase the torque ripple and noise. In this paper the rotor
structure is optimized from the aspects of magnetic-pole embrace, magnetic bridge, and magnetic-pole eccentricity to obtain better
air-gap magnetic field distribution and torque curves.
Index Terms—Finite-element method (FEM), magnetic pole, magnetic bridge, permanent-magnet synchronous motor (PMSM).

I. INTRODUCTION

D UE TO THE excellent performance, permanent-magnet

synchronous motors (PMSMs) are generally considered
as the most promising motors and widely used in many fields
[1]–[5]. Modifications and innovations are often made to the
PMSMs to satisfy different applications. For the PMSMs used in
the compressors of air conditioners, a kind of six-slot/four-pole
structure is very popular nowadays for the advantages of saving Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of the six-slot/four-pole PMSM.
coppers and easy to manufacture. Different from conventional
windings, the six-slot stator windings cannot produce symmet-
TABLE I
rical magnetomotive force (MMF) under the four poles, and MAIN PARAMETERS OF THE PMSM
more harmonics exist in the air gap, which will increase the
torque ripple and noise. In this paper, the finite-element method
(FEM) is used to optimize the rotor from the aspects of mag-
netic-pole embrace, magnetic bridge, and magnetic-pole eccen-
tricity to obtain better air-gap magnetic field distribution and
torque curves [6]–[11]. The schematic diagram of the PMSM is
shown in Fig. 1, and the main parameters are shown in Table I.
TABLE II
CONTRAST OF TORQUE CHARACTERISTICS WITH DIFFERENT
II. OPTIMIZATION OF THE MAGNETIC-POLE EMBRACE MAGNETIC POLE EMBRACES (1)

As to PMSM, both the amplitude and distribution of the

air-gap magnetic field will be affected by the changing of
the magnetic-pole embrace, which will further influence the
average torque and torque ripple. With the volume of the per-
manent magnets kept unchanged, the magnetic-pole embrace
varies from 0.67 to 0.92 by the step of 0.05, and the torque The magnetic-pole embraces of 0.80 to 0.86 with the interval
curves are obtained by time-stepping FEM. From the torque of 0.01 are further compared and the torque characteristics are
analysis, the average torque and torque ripple can be obtained, shown in Table III.
which are shown in Table II. As shown in Table III, the magnetic-pole embrace of 0.85 is
As can be seen from Table II, with the increase of the mag- the optimum point, which gains the average-torque increase of
netic-pole embrace, the average torque continues increasing, 1.44% and the torque-ripple decrease of 4.07% compared to the
whereas the torque ripple decreases firstly and then increases. magnetic-pole embrace of 0.82.
Since the changing of the torque ripple is much sharper than In order to judge the degree of the air-gap magnetic field being
that of the average torque, the torque ripple is used as the cri- close to the sine wave, the aberrance rate of air-gap magnetic
teria to determine the optimum point. The magnetic-pole em- field is introduced, which can be expressed as
brace of 0.82 brings the lowest torque ripple, which is chosen
as a reference point of a smaller range for further investigation.
% (1)

where is the aberrance rate of air-gap magnetic field,

Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TMAG.2007.893631 are the harmonic components of the air-gap
0018-9464/$25.00 © 2007 IEEE
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 2532 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MAGNETICS, VOL. 43, NO. 6, JUNE 2007

TABLE III TABLE V

CONTRAST OF TORQUE CHARACTERISTICS WITH DIFFERENT CONTRAST OF TORQUE CHARACTERISTICS WITH DIFFERENT
MAGNETIC POLE EMBRACES (2) MAGNETIC BRIDGE WIDTH (2)

TABLE IV
CONTRAST OF TORQUE CHARACTERISTICS WITH
DIFFERENT MAGNETIC BRIDGE WIDTH (1)

Fig. 2. Shape of the eccentric magnetic pole.

flux density, and is the fundamental component of the

air-gap flux density. In order to get the optimum point, the torque characteristics
The aberrance rates of air-gap magnetic field are respectively with four new magnetic-bridge widths, i.e., 0.8, 0.9, 1.1, and
25.54% and 24.63% with the magnetic-pole embrace of 0.82 1.2 mm, are further investigated and compared with the case of
and 0.85. It indicates that the optimization of magnetic-pole em- 1 mm, as shown in Table V.
brace can also improve the magnetic-field wave. The data of Table V show that the reduction rates of the
average torque are at quite close range, but those of the torque
III. OPTIMIZATION OF THE MAGNETIC BRIDGE ripple change notably, which can reach the peak value at the
magnetic-bridge width of 0.9 mm. Based on the compromise
The magnetic bridge, which is a part of the rotor core, can
principle, 0.9 mm can be regarded as the optimum point of
protect the permanent magnets from flying away from the rotor,
the magnetic-bridge-width choice. By further analysis, the
but it also provides the path for the permanent-magnet leakage
aberrance rates of the air-gap magnetic field with the magnetic
flux. The shape and size of the magnetic bridge are crucial for
bridge width of 1 and 0.9 mm are respectively 26.43% and
the leakage-flux factor, and also influence the torque, speed, and
24.23%, which also shows the performance improvement.
mechanical intensity, etc. The length of the magnetic bridge has
little influence on the leakage flux, whereas the width of the
magnetic bridge is much more important. The less width the IV. OPTIMIZATION OF THE MAGNETIC-POLE ECCENTRICITY
magnetic bridge has, the better performance the machine can The eccentric magnetic-pole shape is adopted, as shown in
obtain. However, the width of the magnetic bridge can not be Fig. 2. O is the center of the magnetic-pole outside arc, O’ is the
too small with the mechanical-intensity limit of the slice. Based center of the magnetic-pole inside arc, and is the thickness
on the above optimized model (six-slot/four-pole structure and of the eccentric magnetic pole, which changes with the angular
0.85 magnetic-pole embrace), the magnetic-bridge width varies position. Owing to the use of the eccentric magnetic pole, the
from 0.5 to 1.75 mm by the step of 0.25 mm, and the corre- air-gap magnetic field can be more close to the sine wave and
sponding torque characteristics are shown in Table IV, which the cogging torque can be reduced.
are calculated according to the obtained torque curves by FEM. The machine is further optimized with the investigation of the
magnetic-pole eccentricity. The eccentric distance, which is the
It can be seen from Table IV that the increase of the mag- distance between O and O’, varies from 0 to 2.5 mm with the
netic-bridge width reduces the torque ripple, but also causes the interval of 0.5 mm, and the corresponding average torques and
torque loss. So the choice of the magnetic-bridge width should torque ripples are shown in Table VI.
follow the compromise principle: the torque ripple is effectively As shown in Table VI, with the increase of eccentric distance,
reduced but with the torque loss as little as possible. the average torque firstly decreases and then increases, whereas
From the changing rate of the torque and torque ripple in the torque ripple keeps increasing. So it can be deduced that
Table IV, we can see that the torque ripple decreases sharply the better performance will appear at the point of small eccen-
while the torque does tardily when the magnetic-bridge width tric distance, and 0.5 mm is chosen as the reference point for a
varies from 0.5 to 1 mm. However, after 1 mm, the law of smaller range investigation.
changing trend is opposite. So the magnetic-bridge width of The eccentric distance changes from 0.3 to 0.7 mm by the
1 mm is preferred according to the compromise principle. step of 0.1 mm, and the corresponding torque characteristics
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 ZHENG et al.: OPTIMIZATION OF THE MAGNETIC POLE SHAPE 2533

TABLE VI V. CONCLUSION
CONTRAST OF TORQUE CHARACTERISTICS WITH
DIFFERENT ECCENTRIC DISTANCES (1) A PMSM of six-slot/four-pole structure used in the compres-
sors of air conditioners is investigated in this paper. The mag-
netic pole shape of the rotor is optimized from the aspects of
magnetic-pole embrace, magnetic bridge and magnetic-pole ec-
centricity by FEM. To obtain the optimum performance, the
magnetic-pole embrace of 0.85, the magnetic-bridge width of
0.9 mm, and the magnetic-pole eccentricity of 0.45 mm is se-
TABLE VII
CONTRAST OF TORQUE CHARACTERISTICS WITH lected. The torque increases by 3.2%, and the torque ripple de-
DIFFERENT ECCENTRIC DISTANCES (2) creases by 8.7% after optimization. The air-gap magnetic field
is more close to the sine wave with the aberrance-rate decrease
of 6.1%. The PMSM performance can be effectively improved
by the optimization of the magnetic-pole shape.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
TABLE VIII This work was supported by National Natural Science Foun-
CONTRAST OF TORQUE CHARACTERISTICS WITH
DIFFERENT ECCENTRIC DISTANCES (3) dation of China under Project 50577011 and the 863 Plan of
China under Project 2006AA05Z231.

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When the finally optimized magnetic pole shape is employed, Manuscript received October 31, 2006; revised February 8, 2007 (e-mail:
the torque curve is shown in Fig. 3. [email protected]).

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