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Overview
As surface speeds of electrical machinery increase to meet ever more demanding application
requirements, windage power losses due to shearing of air (or other process fluid) between the
rotor and stator take on an increasingly significant role. Historically, these losses have not
received a great deal of research attention. Common approaches include making the rotor and
stator surfaces as smooth as possible, keeping the rotor-stator gap as large as practical without
compromising electrical efficiency, and simply accepting whatever losses are present.
Xdot Engineering and Analysis, along with Computer Aided Engineering Associates, have
recently completed a two year Phase II SBIR effort funded by the US Air Force to look at these
losses in more detail. This work included extensive Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD)
analysis and experiments in a new high speed windage power loss test rig. The outcomes of this
effort included:
Development of an easy to use Ansys/CFX windage power loss modeling and analysis
module.
Generation of a new database of analytically predicted rotor power losses for high speed
electrical machinery.
Development and commissioning of a windage loss test rig capable of accurately
measuring rotor power loss at speeds of up to 60,000 rpm.
Generation of a new database of experimentally measured rotor power loss at relevant
surface speeds and test article scale for 50 kW to 200 kW, high speed electrical
machinery.
Xdot Engineering and Analysis CAE Associates, Inc.
370C Greenbrier Drive, 1579 Straits Turnpike, Suite 2B
Xdot Charlottesville, VA 22901 Middlebury, CT 06762
Xdot Engineering
and Analysis, pLLC
www.XdotEA.com 1 www.caeai.com
Identification of several strategies which are predicted to reduce the windage loses by as
much as 30 percent in specific cases for high surface speed applications. These
approaches also appear to have promise for higher viscosity gasses and fluids at lower
surface speeds.
Another class of machine is the Switch Reluctance Motor (SRM) . The rotor is shaped
with several poles on the rotating cylinder. This geometry results in a more complex mechanism
of windage loss. These poles provide a pumping mechanism while rotating, acting like “blades”
in pumps. Figure 4 shows a representative flow domain (air gap and stator poles) for an SRM.
Figure 5 shows the stator surface pressure contours, which exhibit a non-uniform pressure
distribution in the axial direction, as well as localized pressure gradients where the flow enters
and leaves the stator pole region. Figure 6 shows the streamlines for the cross-section in the
middle of a stator cavity. A recirculating flow region exists following the suction side of each
pole. In addition, Taylor vortices also exist between the pole top and the stator housing in the
axial direction, further compounding windage losses.
Figure 4: Air Gap and the Stator Poles of a Switched Reluctant Motor
Figure 7: Axial Velocity Contours - Before and After the Flow Technology is Applied
Hydrostatic Air
Bearing Supports
0.08
5 repetitions 60 krpm
0.04
0.02
0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60
Speed (krpm)
Figure 10: Raw Data and Error Bars, 0.025" Gap Smooth Wall Test Article
0
10
From Bilgen and Boulos
Test Data
-1
10
-2
10
-3
10
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
10 10 10 10 10 10 10
Reynolds Number (Re = RC/ )
Figure 11: Comparison of Test Data to Bilgen and Boulos 1973 Paper
Acknowledgements
The work described was a Phase I/II SBIR effort sponsored by the Air Force Research
Laboratory (AFRL). This support is gratefully acknowledged.
References
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in the Turbulent Flow Regime”, NASA TM X-52851, 1970.
Braun, M., Kudriavtsev, V., and Corder, R., “Flow Visualization of The Evolution of Taylor Instability and
Comparisons with Numerical Simulations”, Computational Technologies for Fluid/Thermal/Structural/Chemical
Systems with Industrial Applications, Vol. 1, ASME, 2002.
Wild,P.,Djilali, N., and Vickers, G., “Experimental and Computational Assessment of Windage Losses in Rotating
Machinery”, Transactions of the ASME, Vol. 118, 1996.
Ren, W., “Windage and Axial Friction Losses of High Speed Generator”, 2003 International Joint Power
Generation Conference, Atlanta, GA, 2003.
Scurtu, N., Stuecke, P., and Egbers, C., “A Numerical Study of the Three-Dimensional Structure of the Taylor-
Couette Flow in Eccentric Configuration with Superimposed Cross Flow”,15th International Couette-Taylor
Workshop, J. of Physics Conf. Series 137, 2008.
Tong, W., “Numerical Analysis of Flow Field in Generator End-Winding Regions”, Intl. J. of Rotating Machinery,
Vol. 2008, 2008.
Bilgen, E. and Boulos, R., “Functional Dependence of Torque Coefficient of Coaxial Cylinders on Gap Width and
Reynolds Numbers,” Journal of Fluids Engineering-Transactions of the Asme, Vol. March, pp. 122–126, 1973.