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High Speed Rail IDEA Project 44 [Completed (IDEA)]
Permanent Magnet DC Traction Motor with Reconfigurable Winding Control
| Project Data |
| Funds: |
$250,159 |
| Staff Responsibility: |
Chuck Taylor |
| Completion Date: |
3/1/2007 |
| Fiscal Year: |
2003 |
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This is a project to design, fabricate and test a brushless permanent magnet direct current (PMDC) locomotive traction motor. This motor has the potential for higher torque and power capacity than either conventional DC or AC traction motors, and at less than half the size and weight. The PMDC traction motor will have an electronic commutator arrangement that reconfigures the stator windings from series to parallel combinations to reduce the rate at which back-emf increases with speed. This reduces the voltage increase normally required to overcome increased back-emf associated with increasing speed, and thus improves the torque-speed performance. Primary project tasks include the design and development of a prototype PMDC traction motor that could be used in place of motors currently used in GP-38 locomotives. This prototype would be tested on a dynamometer test stand to determine how its performance compares with a conventional traction motor. HSR-44 was a concept exploration project, and included the design of a prototype motor, computer simulations to assess its performance, and the development and laboratory testing of a small prototype. The results were sufficiently encouraging that a follow-on project (HSR-58) is now underway to develop and laboratory test a full-scale prototype motor. If this project proves successful, a next step could be to fabricate four prototypes and install them under a locomotive, such as a GP-38, for a full field test.
The final report for this IDEA project can be found at:
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