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Comment by londons_explore | Hacker News Reader

A tesla Model 3 motor already is partially a reluctance motor. This youtube video describes it rather well, and I'd recommend giving it a watch [1]. Notice the air gaps - thats the reluctance part of the rotor.

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=esUb7Zy5Oio

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> A tesla Model 3 motor already is partially a reluctance motor. This youtube video describes it rather well, and I'd recommend giving it a watch [1]. Notice the air gaps - thats the reluctance part of the rotor.

> [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=esUb7Zy5Oio

I dont think he's using air gaps?

"Instead of using air gaps, Sansone thought he could incorporate another magnetic field into a motor."

Air gaps are the traditional way to make a reluctance motor. Sansone is exploring a different way to make a reluctance motor, improving performance at the cost of added complexity.

if you watch the video, tesla puts the magnets in the air gaps. (around 6m 40s)

does anyone know how it works that towards the end of the video, it shows the resulting torque curve of the motor is actually negative for a decent span. Does this mean the motor actually resists rotation for that arc during every rotation?

Wouldn't that be a significant hit to efficiency, or do the benefits simply outweigh it for a net gain?

I think the idea is that the inverter's job is to always be continually changing the current to the motor's stator windings such that you'd always have close to the optimal angle between the rotor and the magnetic fields created by the stator. Kind of like how a gas engine might backfire if you fired a spark plug at the wrong time so a well designed engine would avoid doing that.

That makes it sound like this could be used to improve Tesla's motors.

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