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A New Generation of Small Electric Motors: More Powerful, Smaller, Greener

Miniature, rotating, high-performance electric motors known as micromotors are used in applications such as prosthetic arms, surgical robots and medical power tools. Windings play a major role in micromotor performance, but they are difficult and expensive to produce.

Among all existing motor types, the slotless brushless direct current (SBLDC) motor achieves the best performance for such applications. SBLDC motors have a simple structure. The rotor is a shaft mounted with a cylinder of permanent magnets and its motion is caused by a rotating magnetic field generated by a cylindrical winding made of knitted copper wires. An iron yoke confines the magnetic field inside the motor, and reinforces the magnetic interaction between the magnets and the wire winding.

The most critical component of these motors is the wire winding that’s currently made of interlaced copper wires. It’s the source of the interaction with the magnets, and defines the power that the motor can generate for a given current.

The EU-funded FlexCoil project (now known as MirmexCoil) set out to “market a new generation of motor windings and micromotors that are easier to build more efficient and provide superior performance compared to existing state of the art and built in Europe” says coordinator Dr François Baudart. “We’re transforming the way micromotor windings are produced.”

Replacing traditional copper wires to take performance to another level

Instead of building windings wire by wire from long lengths of copper, project partners created new innovative copper patterns on a flexible material. When the material is carefully rolled in multiple layers into a tube, a completely new type of high-performance motor winding is obtained. They developed a proprietary process for mastering the complex and critical step of designing the patterns on a printed circuit board and rolling it in several layers with extremely high precision.

The project team obtained excellent results after lab verification of the prototypes. “We’re confident that our technology enables our products to be up to 50 % smaller, and a 70 % increase of the motor dynamics can frequently be observed as well,” notes Dr Baudart. “It generates three times less heating and demonstrates a tenfold reduction in assembly time.” An in-depth study confirmed the solution’s technical feasibility.

There are several user benefits for a broad range of applications. For high-end micromotor customers, the technology reduces the motor’s temperature rise. The lower the temperature, the more durable the bearings and the winding. Dental and surgical device manufacturers are concerned about weight. The innovation reduces the motor’s weight, which represents a significant part of the overall mass. Bio-robotics manufacturers need solutions to increase battery life while adhering to strict weight constraints. The solution reduces the motor’s weight and boosts efficiency. A key element for industrial robotics is dynamics. Productivity is directly proportional to the dynamics of movement. More powerful motors will enable faster movement of the robots’ prehensile tools, thus increasing production rate.

Now finished, the project aims to scale up production volume to meet the stringent user requirements of medical customers. Dr Baudart says the project plans to apply for more funding to “demonstrate that it can deliver its technology at the scale and level of quality that’s expected from a sole-source vendor of critical industrial products.” Then it will be able to perform customer trials, finalise its marketing strategy and prepare for full commercialisation.

Reference source: A New Generation of Small Electric Motors: More Powerful, Smaller, Greener

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