Electromagnetic and Thermal Multi-Physics Design of SPMSM for Wearable Robot

Abstract

With the rising interest in wearable robot, a lot of researches on the wearable robot is being conducted on aspects of both mechanism and control. On the other hand, although the optimization of the motor has a great effect on the performance of the overall system, research on the motor of the wearable robot remains relatively insufficient. Thus, this paper focuses on a proper design process of the motor of the wearable robot. At first, the surface-mounted permanent magnet synchronous motor (SPMSM) is adopted for its high power density and controllability. Then, the considerations in design of the motor for the wearable robot application are defined and categorized into dimensional, electromagnetic, and thermal requirements. Having taken these into consideration, electromagnetic and thermal multi-physics design for the SPMSM is conducted. For the electromagnetic design, the space harmonic analysis (SHA) is used, and for the thermal analysis, lumped parameter thermal network (LPTN) is used. Following the proposed design process, the optimum SPMSM is designed and manufactured. Finally, experiments of the SPMSM are conducted and the validity of this study is verified.