J. Jose Perez-Loya

Design and Characterization of a Rotating Brushless Outer Pole PM Exciter for a Synchronous Generator

Generally, PM machines are used as PMG pre-exciters in 3-stage brushless excitations systems. This paper presents the design, characterization, and prototyping of a rotating brushless PM exciter used in a proposed 2-stage excitation system for a synchronous generator. The proposed design reduces the number of components compared with conventional systems. A comparison with the state-of-the-art conventional excitation systems is given. The design of a fast-response, or high initial response, brushless exciter requires active rectification on the rotating frame, replacing the noncontrollable diode bridge. The objective was to construct an exciter with the capability of a 50 A output field current, as well as a high value of the available ceiling voltage and ceiling current. The final exciter was constructed to be fitted into an in-house synchronous generator test setup. A finite element model of the exciter was validated with experimental measurements. The exciter prototype is also compared with an alternative armature design with nonoverlapping single-layer concentrated windings, but with the same main dimensions. The paper includes a general design procedure suitable for optimization of PM brushless exciters that fulfill the requirements of their synchronous generators and the grid.

Design and characterization of a rotating brushless PM exciter for a synchronous generator test setup

This paper deals with the characterization and construction of a rotating brushless PM exciter intended for synchronous generator excitation purposes. Traditionally, PM exciters are used as pre-exciters in synchronous generator excitations systems. In order to reduce the number of components and to increase the step time response of the system, a PM exciter is designed as an outer pole PM machine, with permanent magnets on the stator and armature windings on the rotor. The exciter was constructed electrically and mechanically to be fitted into an in-house synchronous generator test setup. A finite element model of the exciter was validated with no-load measurements of voltages and magnetic flux densities. The exciter was then characterized with unsaturated and saturated parameters.

Evaluation of different power electronic interfaces for control of a rotating brushless PM exciter

This paper investigates the performance of different power electronic interfaces for a rotating brushless permanent magnet exciter, designed for a synchronous generator test setup. A passive rotating diode bridge is commonly used as the rotating interface on conventional brushless excitation systems. Those systems are known to be slow dynamically, since they cannot control the generator field voltage directly. Including active switching components on the rotating shaft, like thyristors or transistors, brushless excitation systems can be comparable to static excitation systems. Brushless excitation systems has the benefit of less regular maintenance. With permanent magnets on the stator of the designed exciter, the excitation system improves its field forcing capability. Results show that modern power electronic interfaces utilize the exciter machine optimally, increase the power factor, reduce the torque pulsations, maintain the available field winding ceiling voltage and improve the field winding controllability.

Optimization of Force Between Cylindrical Permanent Magnets

We calculated analytically and with the finite-element method the force between two identical coaxial cylindrical magnets for nine different magnetic materials at separations of 1, 3, 5, 7, and 9 mm and for height-to-diameter ratios between 0.1 and 2. For the analytical calculations, we assumed homogeneous magnetization. For the nonhomogeneous case, we used the finite-element method taking into consideration the magnetic flux density vs. field (B-H) curves of the materials. The results show that, similarly for cuboid magnets, the maximum force for a given volume of permanent-magnet material was achieved for a height-to-diameter ratio around 0.4 for homogeneously magnetized (ideal) permanent magnets. We also show that this is not always true for the nonhomogeneous cases. The resulting forces are dependent on the B-H curve of the magnets. As the B-H curves of the materials deviate from their ideal counterparts, the aspect ratio that yields maximum force increases.

Comparison of Thyristor Rectifier Configurations for a Six-Phase Rotating Brushless Outer Pole PM Exciter

Recent technological developments have caused a renewed interest in the brushless excitation system. With the application of wireless communication, the conventional diode bridge has been replaced with fully controllable thyristors on the shaft. It offers the same dynamic performance as the conventional static excitation system. The thyristor bridge of the conventional three-phase exciter needs to be controlled with a high firing angle in normal operation in order to fulfill a requirement of both a high ceiling voltage and a high ceiling current. A high firing angle causes high torque ripple to be absorbed by the exciter stator and a low power factor results in a low utilization of the designed exciter. In this contribution, we present a strategy that solves this problem by looking into combinations of thyristor configurations of a double-star six-phase connection of the exciter. Experimental results are used to verify the circuit models implemented for this investigation. A hybrid-mode 12-pulse thyristor bridge configuration seems to be a good solution for implementations in commercial apparatus. An additional switch interconnects two separate thyristor bridges from parallel- to series connection at the rectifier output, and utilizes the advantages of both topologies.

Testing of Active Rectification Topologies on a Six-Phase Rotating Brushless Outer Pole PM Exciter

The static exciter is dominating among large grid-connected generators due to the weak dynamic performance of conventional brushless exciters. In this contribution, a six-phase double-star outer pole permanent magnet rotating brushless exciter is evaluated with different active rectification topologies. Both thyristor-based and chopper-based topologies are considered. A high speed response brushless excitation system is obtained by replacing the conventional rotating diode bridge rectifier with the proposed active rectification topologies on the shaft. The given two-stage system generates its own excitation power directly from the shaft, contrary to static exciters. The selection of an appropriate rectification topology could minimize the rotor armature phase currents for a given generator field current. The objective is a high-power factor and a high utilization of the exciter machine. An optimal rectification topology makes higher ceiling currents was possible, improving the transient behavior of the synchronous generator. In this paper, we show that six-phase topologies add complexity, but improve exciter redundancy, increase the available ceiling voltage, and reduce the steady-state torque ripple. Experimental results are given for validating the models implemented for the analysis.

Eddy Currents in a Passive Magnetic Axial Thrust Bearing for a Flywheel Energy Storage System

Two types of passive magnetic lift bearings were evaluated in terms of thrust force and eddy current losses. The first type of bearings were based on two sets of segmented Halbach arrays mounted in ...

Simple Method to Calculate the Force between Thin Walled Solenoids

We developed a simple method to calculate the axial force between concentric thin walled solenoids. To achieve this, the force between them was mapped as a function of their geometrical relations b ...