An analytical model of induction motors for rotor slot parametric design performance evaluation

Abstract

Induction motors are commonly used in most electricity generation due to their low investment cost. However, the performance of the induction motors for different applications highly depends on rotor design and machine geometry. For example, changing rotor bar height and width varies the rotor resistance and reactance, thereby leading to variation of the motor efficiency. A parametric study on rotor slot geometry parameters such as opening height, rotor slot depth, and rotor slot width, is carried out to investigate the effect of the parameters on the efficiency of a squirrel cage induction motor. The study is based on analytical model that considers a general-purpose squirrel cage induction motor with the specification of 5.5 kW, 60 Hz, and 460 V. The analytical model is developed and simulated within the MATLAB software environment. The effects of each parameter variation toward efficiency of the induction motor are investigated individually as well as all together using a 4D scatter plot. Results show that the efficiency can be improved up to 0.1% after designing a suitable setting of rotor slot parameters from the initial settings.