Fluid flow and thermal processes in a motor are highly complicated and they cannot be well described with older simulation and testing methods. Measurements inside a fast rotating rotor are very difficult to do due to high circumferential speeds such that it is not easy to ‘see’ thermally what is going on.
3D Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) is therefore the best alternative for the conceptual design and detailed analysis of motors as it allows users to precisely predict the flow structure around the stator coil ends, the distribution of the cooling medium, any pressure losses, the heat transfer coefficients (HTCs) and the overall temperature distribution.
CFD simulations of complex motors and windings can be very slow and tedious to set up, though, using traditional approaches and numerically intensive because of the many small channels and gaps in a motor’s design.
This is where Mentor’s FloEFD 3D CFD rapid Cartesian meshing approach is so valuable to us.