Magnetic-equivalent-circuit modelling of switched reluctance machines with mutual coupling effects

This paper focuses on the fast modelling of Switched Reluctance Machines (SRMs) taking into account the magnetic coupling of the phases through a combined Magnetic-Equivalent-Circuit (MEC) and Finite-Element (FE) approach. The airgap flux and the local saturation of partially overlapping pole corners is considered with a reduced FE model in a preprocessing step. With this combined MEC-FE model, the classical flux-linkage and torque curves can be obtained with good accuracy and low computation time, as demonstrated on an 8/6 SRM. A Simulink model including the mutual coupling effects is developed using 3D look-up tables (LUTs) obtained by the MEC-FE and FE models. The simulation results are compared with those from the model neglecting the mutual coupling. It shows the main effect of the mutual coupling on the average torque.