Power, Electronics, Machines and Drives
Power Electronics, Machines and Drives (PEMD) Group
Electrifying research
Electrification is a key technology to achieving reductions in emissions, and so we are focusing on electricity generation, electrification of transport, energy storage, and electrification of heating.
Currently, around 95% of electricity is produced with a rotating generator, and 45% of electricity is used in electric motors worldwide. This will increase in line with rising demand for pure-electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles and transport solutions. Any improvement in electric machines performance, design and development processes, or manufacturability potentially impacts on a large number of applications.
In line with the challenges faced by industry, our electric machines research focuses on improvements of low and high volume manufacturing processes of electric machines in relation to accurate prediction of their performance and better understood material data.
Underpinning electrification is efficient power conversion using power electronics. Key examples include propulsion inverters for EVs and bi-directional AC/DC converters for energy storage. In particular, newly available wide band-gap semi-conductors especially silicon carbide MOSFETs are enabling more power dense convertors and are important in new areas, such as wireless charging.
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For more information about what we do, please email us at wmgbusiness@warwick.ac.uk
Design for manufacturing
WMG specialises in understanding how materials, manufacturing, and design affect electric machine performance.
Our goal is to eliminate the need for complete motor prototyping by identifying key design factors. The Winding Centre of Excellence grants us unique opportunities to investigate and improve the quality of parts manufactured on campus using production equipment and relate the findings to their impact on the performance of the electric machine in its application. We can manufacture concentrated non-overlapping winding, distributed windings and continuous hairpin windings using a needle winder with multiple stations and our equipment also includes a full range of equipment to manufacture hairpin windings from hairpin forming to laser welding. Trickle impregnation, magnet insertion and magnetising with dedicated end-of-line testing stations are situated in our within the Advanced Materials and Manufacturing Centre (AMMC)
Our investigations include exploring electric steel properties and conducting specific experiments to validate models, collaborating with Professor Claire Davis's steel processes research group. Additionally, we're working to enhance our understanding of the impregnation goodness build factor across various manufacturing processes.
Electric machines modelling
We aim to excel in electric machine modeling, with expertise in developing dedicated tools for design, including advanced 2D and 3D multi-physics modeling.
While experienced in using ANSYS Motor-CAD (especially in our teaching activities), Altair Flux and Fluxmotor, and COMSOL, we seek opportunities to expand our simulation tool portfolio. Our modeling capacity supports the design of electric machines, exploration of material properties' impact, and system studies like power train simulations, low voltage vehicle systems, and inverter-electric machine interactions.
Experimental characterisation of electric machine
Our research group characterises electric machines and drives, improving precision through calorimetry. Test rig experiments enhance processes and boost performance at both part and electric machine levels.
In the realm of electric vehicles (EVs), we comprehensively address on-vehicle power conversion, including propulsion inverters, battery-associated DC to DC converters, and converters between different system voltages. Utilizing advanced facilities, we test systems at high powers of up to 500 kW, focusing on key sub-systems like electric power steering and power quality issues.