IEEE Power Electronics Magazine - September 2020 - 18
The Incredible
Shrinking Motor
Drive
Accelerating the transition to
integrated motor drives
by Thomas M. Jahns and Bulent Sarlioglu
A
technology revolution is unfolding around us as
every major mode of transportation is in some
stage of electrification, whether on land, sea, or
in the air. All of these transportation modes
depend on electric machines that play critical
roles in both propulsion systems as well as in a wide variety
of accessory equipment. Fuel economy and reduced emissions of greenhouse gases and other pollutants are major
driving forces for electrified transportation. Despite the significant differences between these varied transportation
modes, they all share strong motivations to make their electric machines and adjustable-speed drives smaller, lighter,
and more efficient. An excellent example of this trend for
the power electronic drives is provided by comparing the
drive units in the Tesla S (2012) and Tesla 3 (2017). As shown
in the side-by-side views provided in Figure 1, the drive unit
shrank in size from an enclosure that matched the size of its
main traction motor to a much smaller unit that, at first
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MPEL.2020.3011275
Date of current version: 15 September 2020
18
IEEE POWER ELECTRONICS MAGAZINE
z September 2020
©SHUTTERSTOCK/AHA-SOFT
sight, appears to be a non-descript end-bell attached to one
end of the motor. Rather than focusing here on how this
impressive reduction in mass and volume was achieved
(addressed later in this article), the key point here is that
similar technology trends are under way in many of the other
transportation modes as well, making electrified transportation increasingly appealing and competitive in the process.
The Tesla 3 motor-plus-drive assembly in Figure 1
approaches the objective of making the drive electronics sufficiently small and rugged that it can reside inside the same
enclosure that would have housed the machine alone in the
past. This concept of an integrated motor drive (IMD) is contrasted in Figure 2 with conventional adjustable-speed motor
drives that dominate commercial production and use today
consisting of completely separate enclosures for the drive
electronics and the electric machine connected by a power
cable [1], [2]. The opportunities for reducing mass and volume by embedding the drive electronics directly inside the
machine housing are rather apparent in Figure 2 due to elimination of the drive enclosure, but there are other potential
advantages and benefits that may not be nearly as obvious:
2329-9207/20©2020IEEE
IEEE Power Electronics Magazine - September 2020
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Contents
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