Winding Embedded Liquid Cooling for High Power Density Slotless Motor

Abstract

A novel winding embedded liquid cooling (WELC) concept is proposed to improve thermal management of high power density slotless motor. This concept introduces thermal plastic based liquid cooling channels through the non-magnetic thermal plastic winding support for slotless motor. A comprehensive analysis on key thermal paths from all thermal sources to the ambient for the proposed WELC concept is presented. This paper demonstrates the efficacy of the WELC concept for a 120 kW slotless motor using computational fluid dynamics (CFD). A lumped parameter thermal network (LPTN) has also been developed for the WELC concept which has been validated using CFD analysis. It is found that the WELC concept can achieve a continuous current density of 23.3 A(rms)/mm2, which is 50% higher than that of a conventional axial water jacket cooling.