Thermal design of integrated motor drives for traction applications

The thermal design of a propulsion integrated motor drive is faced in this paper. The system is constituted by a 25 kW switched reluctance motor, a water cooled "square" housing with pipes positioned in the corners and converter devices directly mounted on the housing. Thermal analysis with finite element method software is performed and simulation results are provided to obtain the main guidelines to design the housing as heatsink for both motor and converter.