Visteon Helps Its Customers Win Big With New Motor Winding Methodology
12 October 1999
Visteon Helps Its Customers Win Big With New Motor Winding Methodology
DEARBORN, Mich., Oct. 12 -- Visteon Automotive Systems has
won an industrial Oscar for doing what it does best -- making its customers
successful.
Visteon's Computer Aided Design (CAD) expertise helped an entire team of
industrial organizations -- including Ford Motor Company and General Motors
Corporation -- win a coveted R&D 100 Award. The award, commonly known as the
Oscars of Invention, honors the 100 most technologically significant new
products or processes in a year, as judged by R&D Magazine.
Visteon's work in the area of motor design and electromagnetic simulation
resulted in the development of a winding method that increases the power of a
conventional motor by 30 percent. Industry estimates indicate that this
method will lower electrical energy costs by approximately $200 million
annually and will not add any additional costs to the process of manufacturing
engine blocks and components.
"We are very honored to receive this award and the recognition it bestows
upon Visteon's technical expertise and efforts to resolve customer
challenges," said Marcos Oliveira, vice president and chief technology officer
of the Visteon Technology Office. "In this case, we were able to develop a
new method for motor winding that not only benefits the automotive industry
but other industries as well. By working as part of an integrated team, we
were able to assess, and then address, the needs of a variety of industry
organizations."
Visteon's development of the new motor winding process began nearly a year
ago when a team of industry organizations headed by the National Center for
Manufacturing Sciences (NCMS) sought help with a particularly vexing problem.
NCMS is the largest cross-industry research consortium in the United States.
The NCMS team had been investigating the development of a new generation
of spindles to enhance flexible machining in a plant environment. These
spindles will enable manufacturers to produce engine blocks and related
components faster, more efficiently and more economically. The program,
called the Strategic Machine Tool Technologies: Spindles, was co-funded by
team members and the National Institute of Standards and Technology's Advanced
Technology Program.
Progress on the program was being hindered, however, because the high-
speed spindle motor being used in development kept overheating. After nearly
a year of searching for a solution, Ford, GM and other members of the NCMS
team turned to Visteon for help.
Within months of taking on the challenge, Visteon senior technical
specialist Rodolfo Palma had developed a finite element analysis (FEA) of the
motor, had conducted a variety of tests, and proposed a theoretical
explanation for the problem.
"With the help of the FEA, we were able to determine that the proximity
effect in the motor windings was responsible for huge power losses that were
overheating the motor," Palma said. "Since there was no literature to support
this theory, I developed a finite element analysis model of a motor with the
proximity effect on it and then matched the results with the other test data.
"We have been able to prove the proximity effect in the windings produces
power losses 10 to 15 times what conventional industry knowledge had been
saying they were for decades. Any alternating current system with windings
that operate at 60 Hz or higher can be upgraded without increasing
manufacturing costs," he added.
Indeed, discovery that proximity effect -- the effect on currents and
magnetic flux when conductors are in close proximity to one another -- was at
the heart of the problem lead to development of a new winding construction.
This construction will help NCMS team members manufacture reliable, high-speed
industrial motors.
Members of the NCMS program team include Ford, GM, Aesop Inc., Giddings &
Lewis, Manufacturing Laboratories, Inc., The Torrington Company, National
Institute of Standards and Technology (DOC), PCC Olofsson, and Setco Whitnon.
R&D Magazine receives entries from prestigious companies, research
organizations and universities around the world. Awards recipients are
selected by a panel of 70 outside experts and editors from the publication.
With a global delivery system of more than 125 technical, manufacturing,
sales and service facilities located in 21 countries, Visteon is leveraging
the talents of its 77,000 employees to deliver innovative, consumer-driven
systems solutions to its customers.