F. Profumo et al., AXIAL FLUX MACHINES DRIVES - A NEW VIABLE SOLUTION FOR ELECTRIC CARS, IEEE transactions on industrial electronics, 44(1), 1997, pp. 39-45
For electric car propulsion systems, the wheel motor is an application
that requires the electrical machine has shape flexibility, compactne
ss, robustness, high efficiency, and high torque. Axial flux machines
are an interesting solution, where the motor is directly coupled to, o
r inside, the drive wheels, In this paper, axial flux induction and sy
nchronous machines as wheel motor applications are presented and some
considerations for each motor type are drawn by the authors, The struc
ture with two rotors seems to be a very promising solution for both in
duction and synchronous machines, In the induction motor case, the two
rotors can rotate at different speeds, thus the motor can act as a me
chanical differential, The axial flux permanent magnet motor with two
rotors is very compact and can be integrated inside the wheel.