Fast Numerical Methods to Compute Periodic Solutions of Electromagnetic Models

Resumo

The numerical simulation of electrical machines is of crucial interest inelectrical engineering, where design optimization, time-to-market and cost effectiveness have become major concerns in order to face competition in the global market.In the case of squirrel-cage induction machines, one of the challenges is to reducethe CPU time needed to reach the steady-state during the computations, which cantake several days whereas engineers are only interested in the last machine revolutionneeding just a few minutes. Thus, being able to reduce this simulation time is crucialto get a competitive tool at the design stage. This chapter summarizes the history ofhow a real industrial problem led to the development of a novel numerical algorithmfor the solution of the above problem, since the mathematical methods existing atthat moment were not completely satisfactory, in terms of computational time, toapproximate the steady-state behaviour of squirrel-cage induction machines. Startingfrom a brief historical background, the authors explain the main problem to solve,the limitations of the existing techniques and the novel methodology, illustrated withvery promising numerical results. The method still has different aspects to be exploited that would allow not only to expand the range of applications in the field ofelectrical engineering, but also in other areas such as acoustics or hydrodynamics.