Design of a Brushless Doubly-Fed Machine for Aviation Electric Propulsion

This article discusses a high-speed brushless doubly-fed machine (BDFM) for aviation turboelectric distributed propulsion application. After a brief overview of the machine fundamentals and propulsion architecture, the electromagnetic properties of the newly designed BDFM are analyzed. An innovative rotor mechanical design is introduced, which allows for a significant increase of speed compared to legacy rotor designs. Experiments were conducted to verify the 12 000-r/min high-speed operation. The findings in this article will give prominence to the feasibility of applying BDFMs for aviation applications.