Advanced Fault Tolerant 3×3-Phase PM Drive With Concentric Winding for EV Application

Fault-tolerant machine drive is essential for electric vehicle (EV) applications to ensure uninterrupted operation during fault events. Among various fault modes, the inter-turn fault is the most challenging failure for the permanent magnet (PM) drive which requires special measures to suppress the excessive fault current. In this article, a novel concentric winding (CW) is analyzed for a
$3\times3$
-phase PM drive to restrict the turn fault current. Compared with the conventional distributed winding (DW), the two sub-coils of each phase occupy the same space angle, and both align with the phase axis, and the winding factor of each coil is 0.96 which is 4% lower than the DW. Owing to the two aspects, the coil flux linkages are more effectively nullified after applying a winding terminal short circuit (TSC) which indicates a lower fault current. The two machines’ healthy performance as well as various fault modes’ behaviors are investigated by detailed simulation and test investigation. The results prove the CW machine has the same healthy characteristics as the DW machine, and the maximum inter-turn fault current is up to 17% lower than the counterpart. In addition, the improved turn fault current suppression capability is achieved simply by re-arranging the coil layout without introducing any extra cost.