Measurement and Simulation

of the Vibroacoustic Performance

of an Electric Motor
Alex McCloskey, Xabier Arrasate, Xabier Hernandez
and Oscar Salgado

Abstract Noise and vibration of electrical machines is a major concern. Changes

in the machine design to improve its efciency can lead to unacceptable vibrations.
Tools to predict its vibratory and acoustic performance at the design stage need to
be developed. An improved nite element model has been developed to analyse the
vibration behaviour of a permanent magnet synchronous motor (PMSM) using the
nite element software ABAQUS. All components and subsets of the machine have
been modelled and validated by experimental modal analysis (EMA) performed on
them. Some modelling issues have been overcome so that an accurate enough
model has been reached. The laminated stator, as it is formed by a pack of several
steel sheets, has been treated as an orthotropic material and windings have been
considered a solid orthotropic part as well. The rotor-shaft assembly has also been
veried by EMA. The bearings that join the rotor to the assembly of the stator have
been represented by radial springs. The electromagnetic forces are applied to the
whole machine model in order to obtain the vibration response. These forces are
obtained from the magnetic air-gap ux density which has been obtained with a 2D
nite element model developed by FLUX. Finally, the vibration response has been
used to calculate the radiated noise with an acoustic model developed in LMS

A. McCloskey (&)
X. Arrasate

Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering,
Mondragon Unibertsitatea, Loramendi 4, 20500 Arrasate/Mondragn, Spain
e-mail: amccloskey@mondragon.edu
X. Arrasate
e-mail: jarrasate@mondragon.edu
X. Hernandez
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Orona EIC, Polgono Lastaola,
20120 Hernani, Spain
e-mail: xhernandez@orona-group.com
O. Salgado
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Ik4 Ikerlan, P J.M. Arizmendiarrieta 2,
20500 Arrasate/Mondragn, Spain
e-mail: osalgado@ikerlan.es
Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2015
J.K. Sinha (ed.), Vibration Engineering and Technology of Machinery,
Mechanisms and Machine Science 23, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-09918-7_30

339

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Virtual Lab. The results given by the acoustic numerical model are compared with
sound power measurements.
Keywords Electric motors
magnetic noise

Noise

Vibrations

Forced response

Electro-

1 Introduction
The increasing use of inverters has introduced more excitation harmonics which
originate vibration and noise problems. Noise and vibration have a direct inuence
on users perception of quality and comfort. Nowadays, in order to reduce costs, the
efciency of the machine needs to be improved and thus, the geometry of the stator
needs to be optimised, being the vibration behaviour a restriction, as some geometry
modications can lead to unacceptable vibrations.
Noise and vibration in electric motors have different origins that can be classied
into three groups:
Electromagnetic noise: Originated by magnetic forces acting on the stator and
rotor.
Mechanical noise: Originated by bearings, shaft misalignment
Aerodynamic noise: Originated by the cooling fan.
The contribution of these sources changes depending on the working conditions.
In the analysed case, due to the absence of a fan, the aerodynamic noise does not
exist. According to Gieras et al. [2] and Timar and Lai [6], mechanical and aerodynamical noises increase with speed. However, Timar and Lai [6] afrm that in the
very-low-speed domain mechanical and electromagnetic noises are present. Other
authors as Kawasaki et al. [3] assess thatnoise below 1,000 Hz is due to radial
electromagnetic excitation and, according to Lakshmikanth et al. [4], the electromagnetic is the dominating source in low-medium power machines. As in the
analysed machine the rotational speed is low, for a healthy machine mechanical
noise should be low, so just electromagnetic noise will be calculated.
For this task a structural nite element model needs to be developed, which will
be validated by experimental modal analysis (EMA).
In order to model the electric motor some modelling issues need to be overcome.
First, the laminated stator presents different stiffness values in radial and axial
directions, according to Gieras et al. [2], Verdyck and Belmans [7] and Wang and
Lai [8], as it is formed by a pack of several steel sheets. Thus, orthotropic material
properties are applied to the solid part representing the laminated stator. It is hard to
determine those properties the stiffness depends on the compression pressure acting
in the axial direction (Wang and Williams [9] and Watanabe et al. [10]) during
manufacturing and on the procedure used to tie the pack of steel sheets and,
therefore, they are adjusted according to the experimental results.

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Then, different modelling strategies are found in literature for the windings.
Belmans et al. [1] and Wang and Lai [8] consider that the mass supplement due to
windings is more important than the supplementary stiffness, so windings are
treated as additional masses. However, it is hard to know if this strategy might be
applicable for any stator geometry. So according to Gieras et al. [2], the volume of
material representing the stator windings, which lls the slots of the stator, is also
modelled as a solid part. Its orthotropic properties are again estimated according to
the experimental modal analysis results.
When more parts are added, the junctions have to be modelled. Initially screwed
parts are considered strongly joined so that contact surfaces of both parts are glued.
In the case of the rotor, which is supported by bearings, the junction is modelled
introducing radial springs where the bearings are placed.

2 Experimental Analysis
2.1 Modal Testing Set-Up and Procedure
The modal testing equipment consists on:
Acquisition system: two Brel and Kjaer Front-ends and laptop with Pulse
Labshop software.
Impact hammer.
10 triaxial accelerometers.
The system is elastically suspended by rubber bands to avoid the effect of
constraints in the natural modes of the system.
For each analysed system a different spatial discretisation is used resulting in
different number and position of measurement points. The analysed components
are:

Laminated stator.
Laminated stator and windings.
Laminated stator, windings and end-shields assembly.
Rotor and shaft assembly.
The previous two assemblies mounted with the corresponding bearings.

The last assembly (stator, rotor and end-shields) is used to analyse the behaviour
of the bearings and their stiffness. Therefore, the modes of the rotor shaft system
constrained by the stator need to be measured and thus, it is necessary to measure
the acceleration in different points of the shaft. Because of this, other elements as
the brake are not included in this system, as they block the way to the shaft, making
impossible to place accelerometers on it.

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2.2 Vibration Measurement Under Operating Conditions

The vibration measurements under operating conditions are carried out for the
complete motor mounted rigidly on the oor using the same equipment as for the
modal testing except the hammer.
The motor analysed under operating conditions includes the brake, which for the
modal analysis was excluded. Accelerometers are placed on the outer surface of the
machine regularly spaced. The machine operates in no load condition and at
nominal speed.

2.3 Acoustic Power Measurement Under Operating

Conditions
The acoustic power is measured in the same place where the vibration measurements were carried out and in the same operating conditions. Five microphones are
placed at 0.5 m from the machine in an imaginary parallelepiped around it. From
the sound pressure measured at these ve points the acoustic power is obtained
following the standard ISO 3746.

3 Structural Finite Element Model

The structural nite element model was developed verifying each of the main
components with the modes obtained experimentally. For some components, due to
the difculty on estimating its properties, updating processes are carried out using
Virtual.Lab optimisation module. A detailed analysis of the modes obtained for the
different components, the properties assigned to the models and the relative errors
given by the calculations, is presented at EURODYN 2014 [5].
The frequency range analysed by modal analysis is from 0 to 1,000 Hz as the
noise generated by this machine is a low frequency noise (mostly below 1,000 Hz).

3.1 Stator Model

This component formed by a pack of several steel sheets is considered as a solid
part and assigned orthotropic material properties. The resulting properties, similar to
the steel in radial direction and around 3 % of it in axial direction, give relative
errors for the simulated natural frequencies below 6 %.

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Fig. 1 Stator and windings

model

3.2 Stator and Windings Model

The windings are composed of copper wires covered by an insulating material.
Similarly to the laminated stator, the volume of the windings, which lls the stator
slots (see Fig. 1) has been considered as a solid part and assigned orthotropic
material properties, which are adjusted according to the experimental modes.
In the FE model this part is glued to the stator part (see assembly in Fig. 1) using
the constraint tie provided by ABAQUS, which sticks the nodes of the slave
surface to the elements of the master surface.
When the end-shields are assembled, axial deformations are constrained. Thus,
the in-plane modes of the stator and windings system are the meaningful ones and
the updating is focused on them. The relative error obtained for in-plane modes
applied the updated material properties is below 3 %.

3.3 Stator, Windings and End-Shields

This model adds to the previous system the end-shields (see Fig. 2). One of these
two parts is the cover of the motor at one of the sides of the stator and the other part
holds the stator and rotor at one side and the brake at the other side and it is also the
base of the entire motor, holding all its parts.

Fig. 2 Stator assembly: stator, windings and end-shields

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Fig. 3 Shaft and rotor assembly model

These two parts are screwed to the stator and it is considered that this join is
strong enough to be modelled, as if the contact surface pair were welded. The
material of these two parts is the grey cast iron EN-GJL-250 (GG-25) and, applied
its mechanical properties, the biggest relative error for this model is around 5 %.

3.4 Rotor and Shaft Model

The shaft and the rotor (see Fig. 3) are assembled assuming that both parts are
rigidly joined. The shaft is a steel solid part and the rotor is as the stator a pack of
several steel sheets; therefore, similar orthotropic properties need to be applied.

3.5 Complete Motor System Excluding the Brake

and the Pulley
The rotor and shaft assembly is introduced inside the stator, windings and endshields assembly (see Fig. 4) and both assemblies are joined by springs. Each
bearing is modelled by four springs placed with a 90 angle between them in the
centre of the contact surface of each of the bearings. The stiffness of the springs is
set to 50,000 N/mm according to the modes obtained by EMA and relative errors
below 8 % are obtained. However, due to the few measurement points in the shaft,
it is difcult to identify all the mode shapes.
Fig. 4 Stator and rotor
assembly model

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Fig. 5 Complete machine model

3.6 Complete Machine

The brake and the pulley are added to the motor model (see Fig. 5). These parts are
assembled in the same way as in the previous assemblies, considering that they are
joined to the other parts rigidly, so that the contact surfaces are glued.

4 Vibration Response Calculation

4.1 Electromagnetic Forces Calculation
The magnetic pressure distribution in the surface of a tooth and in the surface of a
pole is calculated by FEM (FLUX 2D software) for the period of time corresponding to the fundamental frequency of the machine. In Fig. 6 the magnetic
pressure obtained for the tooth surface is shown. Then, the magnetic pressure along
time was decomposed obtaining the most important frequency components by FFT.

Fig. 6 Magnetic pressure on the tooth surface

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Fig. 7 Acceleration in mm/s2 in the center of the stator, in vertical direction (normal to the
surface) comparison, simulated versus experimental

4.2 Electromagnetic Forces Application to the Structural

Model and Vibration Response Calculation
Introducing the electromagnetic pressure frequency components as pressure loads
in the structural model, by modal superposition, the steady state dynamic response
is calculated. The introduced loads are periodic and thus the obtained response
spectrum is discrete. The damping value introduced to this model was obtained
from the experimental vibration measurements.
The measurements under operating conditions are used to verify the calculated
dynamic response of the machine. In Fig. 7, the discrete spectrum of the calculated
vertical acceleration in the centre of the upper face of the stator, is shown with the
corresponding continuous spectrum of the measured acceleration. As the energy of
the measured acceleration is distributed in a continuous frequency band and the
calculated is not, for a certain frequency the magnitude of the experimental one is
generally below the calculated one.

5 Acoustic Response Calculation

5.1 Acoustic Finite Element Model
The motor nite element model is imported in Virtual.Lab and the air mesh is
introduced between the skin of this model and a surrounding shell called Convex
mesh. The properties given to the air are the density (1.225 kg/m3) and the speed
of sound (340 m/s). Then, the Automatically Match Layer (AML) property is
applied to the external surface of the air which applies the Sommerfeld condition
that imposes to that surface to be a non-reective boundary.

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Fig. 8 Acoustic power comparison, simulated versus experimental

The previously calculated vibration accelerations, which could also be velocities

or displacements, are applied as boundary condition to this acoustic model.

5.2 Acoustic Power Calculation and Experimental Validation

The calculated acoustic power is compared with the acoustic power obtained
experimentally (see Fig. 8). Background noise acoustic power value for the 160 Hz
third octave band is as big as the value obtained with the machine running.
Therefore, according to the standard ISO 3746, the background noise value is
plotted and it is pointed out that the machine acoustic power will be less than the
plotted value but it is not possible to know how much it is.
Analysing the obtained results (see Fig. 8), it can be concluded that except for
the rst two frequency bands (125 and 160 Hz) the agreement between experimental and simulation results is good. In almost all the frequency bands the simulation is below. This makes sense as the calculated acoustic power is just the
electromagnetic noise and the measured also contains some mechanical noise.

6 Conclusion
The rst conclusion is that, as it was observed in the literature, the main modelling
issue is to determine the mechanical properties of the laminated components as the
stator and the rotor and specially the windings. In the case of the laminated stator
and rotor the values of some material properties found at the literature may give
good agreement with the experimental behaviour. However, there are many

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different windings topologies and sizes and, thus, it is hard to establish generally
applicable mechanical properties for this part. To ensure accurate natural frequencies the strategy of modelling the windings as a solid orthotropic part should
be followed adjusting its mechanical properties according to the experimental
results.
The interaction between different parts is another modelling issue. Screwed
parts, with the contact surfaces glued give good agreement with the experimental
results. On the other side, the bearings are properly modelled by springs adjusting
their stiffness according to the experimental results.
After the modes of the structural model have been validated, the main force
excitation frequency components are applied and the vibration response is obtained.
A satisfactory agreement between the calculated and real acoustic powers is
obtained, and it is expected that a better matching between them would be obtained
if the structural model were improved.
Acknowledgments The work presented in this paper has been carried out with the generous
support of the company Orona EIC and the Basque Government (SIRUMA, S-PE12MU010, and
HESIVAMO, UE2013-05).

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