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Inverting a Plot of SEIG Ouput to Produce a Bode Plot (long)

John Popelish suggested this repost.

The self-excited induction generator (SEIG) I am designing is a model
of an SEIG that would provide all the electrical needs of an infantry
solider. Currently resupply of batteries to infantry occupies a
problematic proportion of supply resources. Land Warrior proposes a
networked solider. Objective Force Warrior proposes a "mule" to carry
these supply loads. I believe a bicycle with energy capture ability is
a possible solution to the problems of supplying the Land Warror
without the limited mobility of Objective Force Warrior.

With Daqarta, I can produce a Bode plot of SEIG response or Q, but only
a plot of driven SEIG ouput as a function of parallel capacitance can
provide the actual response of the system. However, a Bode plot of SEIG
response would assist development efforts.

Producing a Bode plot is easy with Daqarta. A sound card output is
applied across the terminals of the motor with parallel capacitor and
the response is measured with the line input or the microphone input.
Predicting the response of the SEIG from a Bode plot is difficult as
the internal losses cannot be measured with this rig.

Driving one SEIG with its corresponding identical motor produces a
certain output at near synchronous speeds if the load is low or nearly
null, such as the oscilloscope and DMM voltmeter load on my SEIG, a
Burden's Surplus Center 10-1134 motor connected to its mate with an 1/8
inch pipe nipple and a threaded rod coaxial with the shaft.

A standard capacitance substitution box, GC Electronics 20-102, range
0.001 - 11.111 ufd, is not quite adequate for the task. It costs the
right amount, about the same as one or two motors, yet offers too
little capacitance (C)) to approach SEIG resonance. It does provide a
fine increment of C for measuring SEIG output with constant drive
frequency.

An extended sub box is on my bench, in construction. It will provide
10-50 ufd and this should be enough, as a trial with 30 ufd produced 1
VAC ouput and with 50 ufd, 0.9 VAC output, indicating operation on the
capacitive/capacitative side of the resonance, while the GC box
operates on the inductive (low frequency side). Six additional 50 ufd
caps are available but may not be needed.

The oscilloscope provides a rather crude frequency measurement but
additional intution as to waveform purity. One more relatively
inexpensive DMM would provide a clear measure of output frequency. I
believe I will find on examination of SEIG output with changing C that
the frequency, while not exactly known, changes less than the
uncertainty of its measurement. We shall see....

Stepping capcitance in 1 ufd increments will produce 50 measurements of
SEIG output as a function of frequency. I don't propose to fit a curve,
only to plot one.

Then the fun begins. Each output data point is a point on a Bode plot,
but they are all the same frequency so a Bode plot of total impedance
versus frequency would just show fifty different positions on a
vertical line. That won't say much.

However, since the shape of the curve is symmetrical when plotted with
log frequency I believe it will be possible to recomposite the data to
produce a true Bode plot without phase data, with frequency (f) on the
X axis and something like z or Q on the Y axis, for the one capacitor
value producing maximum output. That would say a lot; more than a Bode
plot produced with Daqarta would say.

Such a plot would aid a rewinder in choosing a wire size for a stator
rewind. The wire would have to be coarse enough to substantially reduce
the series resistance (R). By reducing the ratio R/sqrt(L) generator
operation *might* be increased from at least 1 VAC currently, at a
likely non-resonant capacitance, to at least 80 VAC, the design goal.

The model design load is a white LED signal lamp produced by Dialight,
and will function as a headlight on the test vehicle, a Lightning Cycle
Dynamics Thunderbolt recumbent bicycle.

Four years have gone into this project. Just about the only thing that
has *not* been tried is a car alternator. A backup battery provides
self-excitation for an alternator. However, the remanant flux in an
SEIG is more reliable than any battery. All the other design loads are
computer style power supplies that go off line at 80 VAC and lower,
protecting the remnant flux in the generator.

The SEIG has been mounted to the front derailer post on the test
vehicle and pedaled chain drive debugged and tested for at least 100
miles. The advantage of pedal drive over wheel drive is that pedal
drive has a smaller long term range than wheel drive. I admit wheel
drive has a smaller short term range than pedal drive, and have
explored wheel drive with a DC generator of hundreds of watts capacity,
but the ability of the test vehicle to park and pedal the SEIG
satisfies the requirement above. Also rear chain drive has a much
longer throw than pedal drive and chain derailment has been a problem;
large bumps derail the wheel drive chain and usually destroy the DC
generator mount.

"All I am asking" :) is how to invert the capacitance based graph to
produce a Bode plot of Q or Z or output as a function of variable f.
Daqarta won't do it; it will only produce a graph of Q or Z, not a
graph of actual output. It's a complicated system!

Yours,

Doug Goncz
Replikon Research
Falls Church, VA 22044-0394
 
B

BFoelsch

Jan 1, 1970
0
Exactly what type of motor is this? How does it start? Is it electrically
reversible?

The fact that a 1/12 hp motor draws 1 amp is a clue that some things are not
optimum. It is possible that this motor has decent efficiency but a poor
power factor, in which case rewinding the stator won't help anything, or it
is possible that the power factor is OK, but the motor is of the shaded-pole
type, which is inherently inefficient, or any other number of possibilities.
I don't think that stator losses are your problem.

How much output have you managed to get with the generator being driven by
an identical motor?

What problems have you had with plain old PM generators?
 
B

BFoelsch

Jan 1, 1970
0
Oops. Looked at the "wiring tab" of the link and see that it is a PSC motor.

Sorry about that.

Even so, what output can you achieve running the thing at full speed at
fixed load?
 
BFoelsch said:
Even so, what output can you achieve running the thing at full speed at
fixed load?

1 VAC so far, and more possibly, if the resonant cap is between 30 and
11 ufd.

Do you mean power output? At 1 VAC, it would be pretty minimal. This is
mentioned in the OP.

Doug
 
J

John Popelish

Jan 1, 1970
0
Winfield said:
[email protected] wrote...
[ snip ] Driving one SEIG with its corresponding identical motor
... Burden's Surplus Center 10-1134 motor connected to its mate with
an 1/8 inch pipe nipple and a threaded rod coaxial with the shaft.


Now that's an interesting $12.88 beast.
http://surpluscenter.com/item.asp?UID=2005062415255748&item=10-1134

Except for the low speed (high number of poles), I think this motor is
just about the exact opposite of what you need for an S.E.I.G. It is
impedance protected, implying an intentional high winding resistance.
And it is a high slip motor (so it can run at well below sync speed)
since the O.P. says its synchronous speed is about 400 R.P.M., while
its rated speed is 225. This implys deep rotor bars or high
resistance rotor bars. It is also single phase, so the rotor has no
excitation for a significant part of each electrical cycle.

I would be looking for a high efficiency (design type E, implying low
slip, therefore low rotor bar resistance and small air gap and low
stator copper and iron losses), 3 phase (for continuous excitation of
the rotor field) motor, if I was determined to go with an S.E.I.G.

But for this low power range, I think a permanent magnet AC motor
(including hybrid stepper motors) would be so much simpler, because
any S.E.I.G may fail to fire up if the rotor remnance falls too low,
so starting mechanism must be included in design.
 
B

BFoelsch

Jan 1, 1970
0
BFoelsch said:
Even so, what output can you achieve running the thing at full speed at
fixed load?

1 VAC so far, and more possibly, if the resonant cap is between 30 and
11 ufd.

Do you mean power output? At 1 VAC, it would be pretty minimal. This is
mentioned in the OP.

Doug


Yikes! That is just the results of remanence in the rotor! No induction
action at all!

Take a look at this link. Much cruder than your intended project, but with
better results.

http://www.otherpower.com/pmg2.html

I think I'd ditch the SEIG, looks to me like a complete dead end.
 
BFoelsh recommended:
I think I'd ditch the SEIG, looks to me like a complete dead end.

Actually, I am working with a hoarding group based on cognitive
behavior therapy to figure out what it will take for me to stop beating
this particular dead horse!

In the meantime, I use *some* of my time and resources to keep at it.

You see, I am learning by playing with these inexpensive components.
And I'm getting the sub box built for future experiments with larger,
faster motors, like Burden's 10-995. That would be driven by a tire,
not pedals. I plan a drop-in frame for that one.

It's like a game of limbo; how slow and small can you go? I've just set
the bar very low for my first pass. If it screws up my knees aren't
going to break the way they would in a real dance contest. Larger is
more expensive, remember? So I am incrementing the bar up until I make
it through. The rewind is a big cost and somebody will have to tell me
it *will work* before I do it, since I could buy a harem of delightful
motors for such a price.

Doug
 
ufd VAC switch
0.1 0.4 0000
5.1 0.5 0001
11.4 0.6 0010
16.4 0.8 0011
20.6 1 0100
24.5 1 0101
28.9 1 0110
34.2 0.9 0110
39 0.9 0111
17.3 0.8 1000
22.3 0.9 1001
28.5 1 1010
33.4 1 1011
39.8 0.8 1100
44.6 0.7 1101
50.6 0.6 1110
55.5 0.5 1111
 
Google trashed my post of data with explanation.

Here is (are?) the data from my first "scan" of the generator.

ufd VAC switch
0.1 0.4 0000
5.1 0.5 0001
11.4 0.6 0010
16.4 0.8 0011
20.6 1 0100
24.5 1 0101
28.9 1 0110
34.2 0.9 0110
39 0.9 0111
17.3 0.8 1000
22.3 0.9 1001
28.5 1 1010
33.4 1 1011
39.8 0.8 1100
44.6 0.7 1101
50.6 0.6 1110
55.5 0.5 1111

The setup was one Burden's Surplus Center 10-1134 motor driving
another, with both a GC Electronics cap sub box and my 10/20/20 ufd sub
box in parallel across the output, and a cheap HF DMM to read 200 VAC.
I used a cheap Chinese LCR meter to get the cap values, with the
generator disconnected. A future scan will have the same or similar cap
values and finer resolution on voltage.

I plotted the data and saw a vague Bode plot shape with peak, two
noses, and appropriately shaped sides. This leads me to believe that it
*is* possible to transform the capacitor "scan" to a frequency scan.

Doug
 
I connected the auxiliary winding of the generator across the line and
read 28 VAC output with a 20 ufd nominal cap across the main winding!
Yipee!

Then I put a *tiny* light bulb across the output. The field collapsed.
Awwww...

Doug
 
P

Paul E. Schoen

Jan 1, 1970
0
I did a little research on SEIGs and it appears that an induction motor must
be first driven by an AC excitation voltage, and then mechanically driven
beyond its synchronous speed in order to use it as a generator. This is the
principle used in micro hyroelectric systems. In this case, the generated
power is driven back into the AC mains, the watt-hour meter runs backward,
and the utility company pays you. I would suppose that, if you had a load
connected to the system, you could tweak the speed so that the generated
power will just equal the load requirement, and you would not draw any power
from the utility line.

The important point here is that the stator of the induction machine must be
energized from an external source. One way to accomplish this SEIG might be
to use a small DC to AC inverter to power the motor, and then mechanically
increase the speed of the motor. You should first load the AC line so that
the generated power will not fry the inverter, but I think this should work.
You can easily monitor the DC current draw of the inverter and then increase
shaft speed until it is reduced to the idle current. One more possibility to
try would be to make part of the load an AC to DC power supply to the input
of the inverter. Once the system is started, you can probably remove the
battery, or use this DC voltage to charge the battery.

One web site that has some more information on this is:

http://home.carolina.rr.com/microhydro/menu.html

There are also articles about this in the following journal (but you have to
pay to read full text)

http://www.inderscience.com/browse/index.php?journalID=13&year=2005&vol=24&issue=1/2

If you are looking for the best size and weight to power ratio, you will
probably want to look at high frequency motors and generators. In this way,
you can reduce the amount of heavy ferromagnetic material.

Paul E. Schoen
P S Technology, Inc.
www.pstech-inc.com
 
Paul said:
I did a little research on SEIGs and it appears that an induction motor must
be first driven by an AC excitation voltage, and then mechanically driven
beyond its synchronous speed in order to use it as a generator. This is the
principle used in micro hyroelectric systems. In this case, the generated
power is driven back into the AC mains, the watt-hour meter runs backward,
and the utility company pays you. I would suppose that, if you had a load
connected to the system, you could tweak the speed so that the generated
power will just equal the load requirement, and you would not draw any power
from the utility line.
(snip)
That's the synchronous mode of operation, differing from synchronous
motor operation. One could also call it the line-excited mode. The SE
in SEIG is "self-excited". Spatially varying remnant magnetism in the
rotor, on rotation, produces time varying stator current, which is
phase shifted by a resonance of parallel C with motor winding L to
produce time varying phased stator current, which induces rotor current
flow, and more spatially varying rotor magnetisation, and apparently
the process only stops when I^2*R losses and other nonlinear losses
overcome the gain of the resonant circuit, hopefully balancing at the
design voltage.

Or something like that.

I may as well ask at this point if an automotive alternator can have
spatially varying remanant magnetism in its rotor, as well, and whether
it can self-excite. Brushes to wear out that way.
One web site that has some more information on this is:

http://home.carolina.rr.com/microhydro/menu.html

There are also articles about this in the following journal (but you have to
pay to read full text)

http://www.inderscience.com/browse/index.php?journalID=13&year=2005&vol=24&issue=1/2

Well, these are line-excited generators, aren't they? There's a whole
host of papers on SEIG theory. I've got a book coming with a good
section on induction generators. It was recommended by Glen Walpert.
If you are looking for the best size and weight to power ratio, you will
probably want to look at high frequency motors and generators. In this way,
you can reduce the amount of heavy ferromagnetic material.

I do agree with that. This whole project is about how small and slow
you can make an SEIG. So far, it's pretty heavy, not real small, but
very slow. It may not work at all, but I'm starting small and slow.
Light, small, slow, pick any two, more or less.


This was a line-excited mode, but it wasn't run faster than synch
speed.

Hmm. Shall I spend my money on a VFD or a rewind? Choices, choices...

Doug
 
P

Paul E. Schoen

Jan 1, 1970
0
I'm still puzzled as to why this device must be a SEIG, and rely on remanent
magnetism. However, you might want to rectify the 28 VAC output you have
acheived, and store the energy in a large capacitor or a battery.

Otherwise, I do not see any way for the AC signal generated by the windings
of an induction motor can produce a frequency higher than the synchronous
speed, unless you have a specially wound multi-speed motor. In this case,
you could use the higher frequency output of the windings with more poles to
energize the windings with less poles, but usually these motors have a 2/1
ratio of speeds. If the motor can tolerate 50% slip, maybe it will work.

Paul
 
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