Evolution and Modern Approaches for Thermal Analysis of Electrical Machines

TLDR

The authors conduct an extended survey of the evolution and modern approaches to thermal analysis of electrical machines. They analyze and compare recent improvements and techniques—including lumped‑parameter thermal networks, finite‑element analysis, and computational fluid dynamics—while addressing challenges in thermal parameter determination and computation, and provide a comprehensive reference list.

Abstract

In this paper, the authors present an extended survey on the evolution and the modern approaches in the thermal analysis of electrical machines. The improvements and the new techniques proposed in the last decade are analyzed in depth and compared in order to highlight the qualities and defects of each. In particular, thermal analysis based on lumped-parameter thermal network, finite-element analysis, and computational fluid dynamics are considered in this paper. In addition, an overview of the problems linked to the thermal parameter determination and computation is proposed and discussed. Taking into account the aims of this paper, a detailed list of books and papers is reported in the references to help researchers interested in these topics.