Favourable slot and pole number combinations for

fault-tolerant PM machines
A.J. Mitcham, G. Antonopoulos and J.J.A. Cullen

Abstract: A new approach is described for selecting pole and slot numbers for fault-tolerant
permanent-magnet machines so that there is inherently negligible coupling between phases
(regardless of other design detail). The preferred slot and pole number combinations thereby help
to ensure that a fault in one phase does not undesirably affect the remaining unfaulted phases.
Other well-known criteria for fault-tolerant operation, including high phase inductance, also have
to be met. It is demonstrated how particular slot and pole combinations can be used to eliminate
low pole number armature MMF, thereby reducing the vibration and stray loss present during
normal operation.

1 Introduction (vi) The converter must be designed for fast detection and
response to various open-circuit and short-circuit fault
Permanent-magnet (PM) brushless motors and generators conditions (including turnturn faults).
are increasingly required to have a high fault tolerance for
use in critical applications where any failure of the machine
or power electronics would jeopardise safety and conve- Armature windings with coils around alternate teeth as in
nience (such as in aircraft and other transport systems). In (ii) are commonly called modular windings. Such windings
such cases, PM machines usually offer higher power density greatly reduce the magnetic coupling between phases but do
and are the preferred technology, as long as they are not necessarily minimise the coupling to the extent required
capable of continued operation (perhaps with reduced for fault-tolerant operation. From the designers viewpoint,
power) following isolated failures in the machine or its drive increasing the per-unit reactance usually requires semi-
electronics. enclosed stator slots with deep slot openings; reducing the
The design and operating principles of fault-tolerant PM magnetic coupling frequently means having unnecessarily
machines were set out by Jack et al. [1, 2] in the early 1990 s, deep magnets.
as follows: This paper shows that a more effective means of limiting
inter-phase coupling is by the precise choice of pole and slot
(i) The pole number must be similar to the number of stator number. The medium-sized power-dense machine design
slots (typically with the number of slots per pole in the range given as an example has a very low interphase coupling with
0.71.5). a high per unit reactance and open slots. As shown in the
(ii) Armature coils are wound around alternate teeth of the paper, the choice of slot and pole number also inuences
stator, so that the coils of a given phase are physically rotor stray losses and stator vibration.
separated and magnetically decoupled from those of other
phases. 2 Three-phase and six-phase machines
(iii) The number of phases is high (at least four) so that the
Figure 1 shows two alternative slot and pole combinations
loss of one phase does not cause excessive torque ripple or
for a small three-phase PM machine with modular wind-
excessive disturbance to the DC link current in the
ings, which might be considered suitable for fault-tolerant
converter.
operation. One machine has 12 slots and 8 poles while the
(iv) Each phase of the machine is connected to a separate other has 12 slots and 10 poles. Both machines are shown
single-phase converter module (usually an H-bridge PWM with semi-closed slots, which would be normal for small
converter). PM machines of this type.
(v) The per phase synchronous reactance is typically 1.0 per The relationship between the respective phases (current
unit, or higher, so that the short-circuit current that ows or EMF) for both designs is also shown in Fig. 1. The 12/8
under single-phase fault conditions is no greater than the design has an angular displacement of 120 electrical degrees
rated phase current. between coils. In contrast the 12/10 design has an angular
displacement of 601 between coils, but we can arrive at the
more usual 1201 three-phase system using anti-phase
r IEE, 2004
connection of opposite coils. Note that the adjacent coils
IEE Proceedings online no. 20040584
of Fig. 1b would normally be labelled A, C-, B, A-, C, B- to
emphasise the usual 1201 angle between phases, whereas the
doi:10.1049/ip-epa:20040584
convention adopted here emphasises the 601 angle between
Paper rst received 30th September 2003 and in revised form 2nd April 2004.
Originally published online: 10th August 2004 adjacent coils. As will be seen in Section 3, the alternative
The authors are with Rolls-Royce plc, Strategic Research Centre, PO Box 31, convention is useful for deriving windings with higher phase
Derby DE24 8BJ, UK numbers.
520 IEE Proc.-Electr. Power Appl., Vol. 151, No. 5, September 2004
 A A number of phases and is likely to give unacceptable torque
ripple and DC link current ripple, operating with only two
C
N
B C S
N
B
out of three phases under faulted conditions. Although this

S
design could be operated as a six-phase machine (with six

S
S
separate H-bridge converters, feeding a single coil per

N
N
N
N

phase) this would require splitting of the phases, so that

S
there is again undesirable interphase coupling.

S
S

N
B N C B N
S C As will be shown in the following Section, a six-phase
machine having minimal interphase coupling requires at
A A least 24 slots, combined with either 22 or 26 poles.

A
3 Preferred slot/pole combinations with
A
increased number of phases
C B
As intimated in the foregoing, certain slot and pole number
combinations give (inherently) negligible coupling between
C B B
phases. Windings with the desired low interphase coupling
C
may be constructed, following the example of Fig. 2b, using
A a sequence of m coils, where m is the phase number, with at
a b least two sequences alternately in anti-phase. Such windings
are feasible with any phase number (odd or even), as shown
Fig. 1 Diagrammatic three-phase PM machines with modular generally in Fig. 3.
windings, showing also the phase angle between coils
a 12 slots and 8 poles
b 12 slots and 10 poles
C

B
A
Figure 2 shows the single-phase armature ux pattern B
(ignoring the ux associated with slot leakage) for both of
A m C
these designs. For clarity, in each case, the magnets are
unmagnetised and only phase A is excited. It is clear that
the 12/8 design of Fig. 2a has a four-pole armature ux
pattern, whereas the 12/10 design of Fig. 2b has a two-pole m
A
armature ux pattern. It is also clear that the four-pole ux
pattern of Fig. 2a has appreciable magnetic coupling B
A
m
between phases, whereas the two-pole ux pattern of B
Fig. 2b has no coupling between phases (only between the b
coils of one phase). C

Fig. 3 Generalised m-phase machine with two anti-phase coils per

phase
a Coil sequence
b Phase sequence showing m phases and m anti-phases with separation
y p/m

For any modular winding with negligible electromagnetic

coupling between phases, the basic winding module (with
the smallest allowable number of slots and poles) has just
two anti-phase coils per phase. For any such winding with
a b m phases and S slots, the required number of poles is
given by:
Fig. 2 Single-phase armature flux pattern for 12/8 and 12/10 PM
machines (showing airgap flux only)  n
2p S 1
1
2m

and the resulting phase angle between adjacent coils is given

The signicant interphase coupling of the 12/8 design by:
means that a fault such as a terminal short circuit of one
 n
phase would have an undesirable effect on the remaining
ym 2p 1
radians electrical 2
(unfaulted) phases. A 12/8 design can only be used for fault 2m
tolerant applications if designed with deep slot openings and
deep magnets (hence retaining high phase reactance with where n 1, or n any non-zero odd integer less than m,
limited magnetic coupling). such that n and m do not share any common factors. Note
The 12/10 combination appears to have zero coupling that good design practice necessitates a high coupling
between phases and therefore seems a better design for fault between the magnets and coils and this implies that n/m
tolerant operation. Arguably this design has an insufcient should be no greater than about 0.6.

IEE Proc.-Electr. Power Appl., Vol. 151, No. 5, September 2004 521
Table 1: Slot and pole number combinations for modular PM machines

number of number of number of slot/pole Phase angle Fundamental one-phase Lowest m-phase armature
phases m slots S poles 2p constant n difference ym360 armature pole number pole number

3 12 10, 14 1 60 elec deg 2 2

4 16 14, 18 1 45 2 2
5 20 18, 22 1 36 2 2
5 20 14 3 108 2 6
6 24 22, 26 1 30 2 2
7 28 26, 30 1 28 2 2
7 28 22, 34 3 80 2 6
8 32 30, 34 1 22.5 2 2
8 32 26, 38 3 67.5 2 6
9 36 34, 38 1 20 2 2
10 40 38, 42 1 18 2 2

4 32 28, 32 1 45 4 4
5 60 54, 66 1 36 6 6
5 40 36, 44 1 36 4 4
5 40 28 3 108 4 12
6 48 44, 52 1 30 4 4
7 56 52, 60 1 28 4 4
7 56 44, 68 3 80 4 12
etc. etc.

(Note that slot/pole number combinations shown below the break have four or more coils per phase and are multiple sequences of earlier
combinations.)

Examination of (2) with n 1 shows that the phase angle machine being considered by Rolls-Royce plc as part of the
difference between adjacent coils is p/m rad, as shown in More Electric Aircraft initiative [4]. Some key design
Fig. 3b. parameters for the machine are shown in Table 2. The
Table 1, derived from (1) and (2), lists the various slot generator is designed for directly mounting on the low-
and pole combinations with negligible interphase coupling pressure (LP) shaft of a multi-shaft gas turbine. It will be
for phase numbers between 3 and 10. As seen in Table 1, mounted at the rear of the engine in a shrouded space
the majority of preferred slot combinations have n 1; but within the tailcone, close to the LP shaft rear bearing. The
higher values are also feasible, for example n 3 (with 5, 7, generator will be indirectly oil-cooled using engine lube oil
8, 10 or 11 phases) and n 5 (with 11 or 12 phases). A in contact with the stator housing.
higher value of n is advantageous in that it contributes to
reduced rotor stray loss (see Appendix) and reduced
vibration; these factors are considered in the case study in Table 2: Key design parameters of fault tolerant generator
Section 4.
The phase number given in Table 1 is the maximum Rated power 250 kW Number of poles 28
number of distinct phases, with the given slot and pole Rated speed 1400 rpm Number of slots 40
number, incorporating both phase and anti-phase coils.
Speed range 14003100 rpm Phase emf 130 V
However, as can be shown from Fig. 3, with an even
number of phases, the phase number can be halved by series Stator bore 350 mm Sync reactance xs 0.47 O(1.39 pu)
connecting adjacent pairs of coils. For example, the ten- Number of 5
phase winding given in Table 1 could be reduced to ve- phases
phases with twice the number of coils per phase; both ve-
phase and ten-phase designs would have negligible coupling
between phases and be equally suited to fault-tolerant
operation. The ve-phase generator output will be rectied to a DC
Other papers have considered the formulation of link (e.g. DC aircraft power bus) via a voltage source PWM
modular windings from a different perspective (for example converter (active rectier) using ve single-phase converter
in [3]). The approach used in this paper is based on the modules, one for each phase. The high generator reactance
perceived need for low phasephase coupling. (here in excess of 1.0 per unit) combined with a PWM active
rectier enables good voltage control over the 2.2:1 speed
4 Case study: a fault-tolerant generator for the range and also facilitates fault-tolerant operation [5]. Note
More Electric Aircraft that the per unit reference is dened here, in the normal
convention for permanent-magnet machines, as the rated
4.1 Description of design EMF divided by rated current.
This case study examines in more detail the design The chosen design has 40 slots and 28 poles (this being
implications and nite-element (FE) results for a ve-phase one of the favoured combinations shown in Table 1). The
522 IEE Proc.-Electr. Power Appl., Vol. 151, No. 5, September 2004
magnet system would be held in place by a non-conducting interconnections (avoiding unpaired conductors in the end
retaining system. windings).
A comparable FE analysis has been done for a ve-phase
4.2 Mutual coupling design with 40 slots and 32 poles, the results also being
This 40-slot 28-pole generator has been analysed with the shown in Table 3. The mutual coupling in this case is 4.4%,
aid of 2D FE analysis. Figure 4 shows the full load which is 20 times greater than for the 28-pole design. In
armature ux plot with single-phase excitation (phase A most other respects the two designs perform almost
only) with the magnets unmagnetised. Visual inspection of identically.
the FE plot suggests (as expected) that there is no phase A Other PM machine designs with non-preferred slot/pole
armature ux linking the other phase coils B, C, D or E. combinations may have rather greater interphase coupling
However the detailed results of Table 3 show that there is a than in the example given here, consequently degrading the
small but nite mutual ux linking all the phases, which is performance of the machine/converter system and poten-
due to tooth tip leakage ux jumping across two or more tially confusing the health monitoring and fault-detection
slots. Saturation in the iron is not a factor here, since the scheme. Using a preferred slot/pole combination will
ux density in the rotor body and the stator core and teeth automatically lead to minimal coupling between phases
is no more than about 1.0 T. irrespective of dimensional design details.

4.3 Stator MMF harmonics

Another important consideration for all modular (fractional
slot) machine designs is the presence of armature MMF
harmonics and the effect that these have on rotor stray loss
and noise and vibration.
Figures 5a and b show the armature mmf distributions
for the 28-pole and 36-pole designs, both of which have
preferred slot/pole combinations as dened earlier. The 36-
pole design is subject to a signicant fundamental (four-
pole) MMF whereas the 28-pole design is subject only to
3rd harmonic MMF (12-pole) and above. Clearly, for
modular windings of the type discussed, the principal
harmonic of armature MMF is related to the value of n in
the equations of Section 3.

0.6

0.5
c (n)
0.4
Fig. 4 FE armature flux plot of 40/28 PM machine with phase A
excitation and magnets unmagnetised 0.3

0.2

0.1

Table 3: Armature flux linkage with IA 300 A (zero current 0

in other phases) 1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23 25 27 29 31 33 35 37 39
harmonic
40 slots, 28 poles 40 slots, 32 poles
a
0.6
Phase A 11.95 mWb 100% 11.466 mWb 100%
Phase B 0.028 mWb 0.23% 0.507 mWb 4.42% 0.5
c (n)
Phase C 0.007 mWb 0.06% 0.498 mWb 4.34% 0.4
Phase D 0.007 mWb 0.06% 0.494 mWb 4.31%
0.3
Phase E 0.029 mWb 0.24% 0.510 mWb 4.45%
0.2

0.1

0
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23 25 27 29 31 33 35 37 39
Note that the FE analysis covers just half of the motor harmonic
(two coils of each phase). With an anticlockwise numbering
b
of slots, the phase distribution is phase A in slots 1 and 2
then phase B in slots 3 and 4 etc. Fig. 5 Armature MMF distributions for the 36-pole and 28-pole
The greatest phase A mutual ux (linking with phases B designs (1.0 pu MMF baseline is the MMF in one armature coil)
and E) amounts to only 0.24%; thus an open-circuit or a 40/28 design
short-circuit fault in phase A has almost no effect on other b 40/36 design
phases, which would then continue to operate normally.
Note that a similarly low mutual coupling may be achieved
with a 36-pole design. In either case the low mutual Note that the harmonic number, indicated in Fig. 5, is
coupling also requires that due attention be given to the coil based on the four-pole fundamental present under single-

IEE Proc.-Electr. Power Appl., Vol. 151, No. 5, September 2004 523
phase excitation. The FE plots of Fig. 6, which show the design is 0.57 T (compared to 1.81 T for the 36-pole design).
armature ux under normal ve-phase operation, conrm This represents a three-fold reduction in armature ux per
that the four-pole armature MMF is present in the pole. The radial ux density in the air gap (and in the
armature MMF wave of the 36-pole design but not in that magnets) is similar for both designs.
of the 28-pole design. Note in Fig. 5 that the 36-pole design In the normal (unfaulted condition) the 28-pole design
has a strong 36-pole armature MMF, whereas the 28-pole produces substantially less ovalising vibration (which is a
design has a strong 28-pole armature MMF. These are the major source of noise in radial ux machines) and
respective MMF harmonics, which are responsible for substantially lowers the armature-induced stray loss in the
producing useful torque. rotor core (which is a signicant contribution to overall
rotor loss), as shown in the Appendix and Table 4.

Table 4: Rotor core eddy loss due to fundamental armature

flux harmonic

28-pole design 36-pole

design

Rated speed of rotor (1.0 per unit) 1050 rpm 1050 rpm
Rated fundamental frequency 245 Hz 315 Hz
Principle armature MMF harmonic 3 1
Armature pole number 12 4
Rotational speed of arm flux 2.33 pu 9 pu
(with respect to stator)
Rotational speed of arm flux 3.33 pu 10 pu
(with respect to rotor)
Frequency of stray flux in rotor 350 Hz 350 Hz
Peak rotor stray flux density 0.59 T 1.81 T
(see Fig. 6)
Rotor eddy loss due to principle 8.2 W 77.5 W
arm harmonic

In the faulted condition, both the stray loss and ovalising

vibration will increase because of the reappearance of the
four-pole armature MMF. However, increased vibration
and stray loss would usually be expected in any machine
with a faulted winding, regardless of slot and pole number.
Fig. 6 Finite element armature flux plot of 40/28 and 40/36 In many applications, a reduced performance under faulted
machines with full load five-phase excitation conditions is usually acceptable (but a suitable choice of slot
a 40/28 design and pole number improves the performance under normal
b 40/36 design conditions).

5 Conclusions
The (fundamental) four-pole armature MMF harmonic,
which arises in the 36-pole design, is undesirable for several As shown by this paper, certain combinations of slot and
reasons: pole number force the coupling between phases to be
 The corresponding harmonic ux penetrates deeply into essentially zero, regardless of magnet depth and other
the rotor core and signicant eddy current losses may details of the design. These newly identied slot and pole
therefore be induced in the rotor core and the magnets. (In number combinations open up new options for permanent-
practice, the need to minimise rotor losses often requires a magnet machine design and are particularly useful for fault-
laminated core and some degree of magnet subdivision.) tolerant applications.
The paper also shows that particular slot and pole
 The stator core will be subject to a four-pole (eight-node)
number combinations effectively eliminate low-order arma-
ovalising force, which will be manifested as stator vibration. ture MMF harmonics, leading to useful reductions in rotor
An increased stator core section is likely to be needed to stray loss and stator ovalising vibration under normal
increase core stiffness to low node-number vibration. operation.
 As well as radial vibration of the stator, additional
torsional vibration can occur owing to the interaction of
low pole number armature mmf harmonics with low pole 6 Acknowledgements
number variations in magnet ux (for example due to rotor
eccentricity). The authors would like to acknowledge the support of
Rolls-Royce plc, who have sponsored this work as part of
its More Electric Engine initiative. The nite-element
The detailed FE results (Fig. 6) show that the peak rotor analysis was undertaken using the proprietary SPEED
core ux density due to armature MMF for the 28-pole software from the University of Glasgow.
524 IEE Proc.-Electr. Power Appl., Vol. 151, No. 5, September 2004
7 References As shown in Table 4, the armature-induced ux in the
rotor core for the 28-pole design has a peak 12-pole ux
1 Jack, A.G., and Mecrow, B.C.: Safety critical drives for aerospace density of 0.59 T whereas that of the 36-pole design has a
applications. Int. Conf. Electrical Machines ICEM94, Paris, France,
1994, pp. 9196 peak four-pole ux density of 1.81 T. The eddy loss due to
2 Mecrow, B.C., Jack, A.G., Haylock, J.A., and Coles, J.: Fault tolerant the fundamental armature ux may be estimated from the
permanent magnet machine drives, IEE Proc., Electr. Power Appl.,
1996, 143, (6), pp. 437442 classic formula, P (o2B2t2)/24r (W/m3), where B and o
3 Ede, J.D., Atallah, K., Wang, J.B., and Howe, D.: Modular fault are the peak ux density (tesla) and the electrical frequency
tolerant permanent magnet brushless machines. Int. Conf. on Power (rad/s), respectively. The rotor core is assumed to comprise
Electronics, Machines and Drives (PEMD), Bath, UK,, 2002, pp.
415420 laminations of thickness t 0.20 mm and resistivity
4 Provost, M.J.: The more electric aero-engine: a general overview from r 40  108 O m. The formula must be used with care,
an engine manufacturer. Int. Conf. on Power Electronics, Machines using the correct relative speed for the mmf harmonic to
and Drives (PEMD), Bath, UK, 2002, pp. 246251
5 Mitcham, A.J., and Cullen, J.J.A.: Permanent magnet generator properly predict the armature ux passing frequency.
options for the More Electric Aircraft. Int. Conf. on Power Electronics, The rotor core eddy current loss for the 28-pole design is
Machines and Drives (PEMD), Bath, UK, 2002, pp. 241245
6 Haylock, J.A., Mecrow, B.C., Jack, A.G., and Atkinson D., J.: calculated to be an order of magnitude lower than for the
Operation of a fault tolerant PM drive for an aerospace fuel pump 36-pole design (and is such that it may be feasible to use a
application, IEE Proc., Electr. Power Appl., 1998, 145, (5), pp. 441448 solid rotor core). More detailed calculation shows that the
7 Mitcham, A.J., Antonopoulos, G., and Cullen, J.J.A.: Implications of
shorted turn faults in bar wound PM machines, IEE Proc., Electr. 28-pole design also has lower armature-induced eddy losses
Power Appl. (in press) in the magnets and hysteresis in the rotor core. (The two
designs would have similar tooth-ripple loss and in both
8 Appendix cases it is likely that tooth ripple would be minimised by
using magnetic slot wedges or by segmenting the magnets.)
Rotor stray loss calculations Under various fault conditions, as analysed in [6] and [7],
The rotor stray loss comprises armature-induced eddy the rotor losses will increase due to unbalanced armature
current and hysteresis loss in the magnets and the rotor core loading. For example, in a ve-phase fault tolerant machine
and also eddy current loss in the magnet faces due to tooth loss of one phase will result in the output being up to 80%
ripple. This Appendix looks just at the eddy current loss, of full rated power, subject to satisfying both the cooling
under normal steady-state conditions, in the rotor core due requirements due to additional rotor losses and the system
to the fundamental armature-induced uxes as indicated in requirements such as torque ripple.
Fig. 6.

IEE Proc.-Electr. Power Appl., Vol. 151, No. 5, September 2004 525