A Robust Design Methodology with FEA of SRM for Efficient Heavy Duty Exhaust Fan Application

In this paper, a design methodology is presented for heavy duty switched reluctance motor (SRM) exhaust fan (HDEXF) application. A commercially available squirrel cage induction motor (SCIM) based HDEXF is used for initial sizing and motor performance comparison with proposed SR motor. The power ratings of the exhaust fan motor depend upon the air flow rate. A 3-phase, 12/8 pole SR motor configuration is preferred because of balanced flux distribution in the stator core which leads to higher efficiency and low acoustic noise. Double layer concentrated winding is used in stator pole which ensuring low end winding volume and copper loss. Finite element analysis (FEA) is used to obtain the static characteristics of the motor using Ansys/Maxwell software. The static performance of the motor is analyzed with different current and at various position. Then-after, the static data is used for a look-up table-based simulation model and motor performance is verified in MATLAB Simulink. The dynamic motor performance at load condition using Maxwell Circuit shows good agreement with MATLAB Simulink result. The efficiency of the proposed motor is more than 86% which is higher than the commercially available SCIM based HDEXF.