Multi-Axial Sliced Finite-Element Model for Toroidal Inductors

This article demonstrates a novel approach for analyzing 3-D electromagnetic fields in toroidal inductors with minimal computational time and resources. A 2-D magnetodynamic finite-element (FE) problem is solved in several axial and radial slices of the 3-D inductor geometry using the AVI formulation. A procedure to couple the slices with each other through circuit equations and suitable interface conditions is proposed. The obtained results are validated with a 3-D FE model in a time-harmonic case. The modeling shows massive reduction in computation time compared to traditional 3-D FE analysis.