Design and Evaluation of Reduced-Rare-Earth Interior Consequent-Pole Permanent Magnet Machines for Automotive Applications

This article investigates the feasibility of interior consequent-pole permanent magnet (ICPM) machines with reduced rare-earth magnet consumption for automotive applications. A new ICPM machine with a double-layer V-shaped permanent magnet (PM) arrangement is proposed and compared with a commercial Nissan Leaf interior PM (IPM) machine. Their basic electromagnetic performances and rotor mechanical strength are evaluated by finite-element (FE) simulation. It shows that the proposed ICPM machine exhibits comparable torque capability, similar high-efficiency region, and significantly improved PM utilization ratio compared with traditional Nissan Leaf IPM case. Besides, to verify the universality of ICPM designs with reduced-rare-earth consumption, two typical ICPM machines with different magnet configurations (single- and double-layer V-shaped) and power levels (80 kW and 2 kW) are, respectively, investigated and compared with their corresponding traditional IPM counterparts. Finally, some tested results on an ICPM machine prototype with V-shaped magnets are carried out to validate the FE analysis.