New Electric Motor Design Massively Boosts Power, Torque, and Efficiency

A Texas-based, father/son team raised $4.5 million in seed funding to build “a remarkable electric motor technology,” reports New Atlas. Long-time Slashdot reader Namarrgon writes: Linear Labs’ impressive new circumferential flux motor design (video) uses four rotors [where other motors typically run one or two] and a software-reconfigurable, multi-coil stator, enclosed in a 3D magnetic “torque tunnel” to maximize efficiency even at high speeds. The stator can be configured on the fly by regrouping coils to use a variable number of overlapping phases simultaneously, producing full torque smoothly at low rpms without torque pulsing, or changing speeds with no change to frequency, current, or voltage, like an electronic transmission. An innovative approach to field weakening by gradually misaligning permanent magnets allows efficiencies to actually climb as speeds increase. These features produce a highly compact motor with two to five times the torque density, at least three times the power density and at least twice the total output of any conventional permanent magnet motor of the same size. This also eliminates the need for gearing in many applications, reducing costs and weight while gaining 10-20% more range from a given battery pack. Linear Labs has received 21 patents so far, with another 29 pending, and their prototypes have been verified by independent expert tests. Recently they received $4.5 million in seed funding, and are planning to build them into car and scooter prototypes over the next couple of years.