Permanent magnet synchronous motor traction drive system for electric locomotives in India

Abstract EN

The Electric Locomotives in the Indian Railways network have heen using either Direct Current Sériés Motor or Squirrel Cage Induction Motors as Traction Motors.

The Locomotives using Sériés Motor are heing slowly withdrawn from services and more number of Locomotives with Squirrel Cage Induction Motors is being manufactured now.

As compared to a Permanent Magnet Synchronous Motor, a Squirrel Cage Induction Motor has lesser efficiency due to losses in the Rotor circuit.

Also, the Electric Locomotives in India are configured to work at unity power factor as the Squirrel Cage Induction Motors work at lagging power factor.

As the Permanent Magnet Synchronous Motors have no Rotor Losses and run at almost unity power factor with improved efficiency, the use of the same as Traction Motor for Main-Line Locomotives with a speed range of 120-200 Kmph is attempted in this paper.

In order to reduce the financial burden of paying for the reactive power, on the Indian Railways we in this paper propose a Drive System with Permanent Magnet Synchronous Motor as Traction Motor for Electric Locomotives of Indian Railways