Apparatus and methods are provided for operating an electric motor, comprising selectively energising the coils of a stator having a plurality of stator teeth, each stator tooth having a said coil mounted thereon. The stator coils of a subset of the stator teeth are energised during a given time period to attract a corresponding rotor tooth into alignment with each of the stator teeth in the subset over the given time period. The stator coil of at least one stator tooth in the subset is energised during a portion of the given time period before the at least one stator tooth overlaps the corresponding rotor tooth.

A switched reluctance motor system includes a switched reluctance motor, a rotor including a plurality of salient poles, a stator including a plurality of salient poles, coils of three phases wound around the salient poles of the stator, and an electronic control unit. The electronic control unit is configured to drive the switched reluctance motor in a pole configuration pattern of NSNSNS in which the salient poles of the stator that have different polarities are alternately arranged. The electronic control unit is configured to perform current waveform control when an excitation sound frequency of a given order coincides with a resonance frequency of the switched reluctance motor.

A starter includes a three-phase switched reluctance electric motor including a rotor and a stator, a pinion gear, a power inverter that is connected to the stator, and a rotational position sensor. The rotor includes a quantity of rotor poles that is between 6 and 16, and the stator includes a quantity of stator poles that is between 8 and 24. An outer diameter of the electric motor is less than 85 mm. An active length of the motor is less than 50 mm. An airgap distance between the rotor and the stator is between 0.1 mm and 0.5 mm. A ratio between a rotor pole arc and a stator pole arc is at least 1.0:1. A ratio between a stator diameter and a rotor diameter is at least 2.0:1, and a ratio between a stator pole height and a rotor pole height is at least 2.5:1.

A circuit element includes an upper switching device, a lower switching device, an upper diode device, and a lower diode device. An upper drain is connected to a first terminal connected to a positive electrode of a power supply, and an upper source is connected to a third terminal. A lower drain is connected to a fourth terminal, and a lower source is connected to a second terminal connected to a negative electrode of the power supply. An upper anode is connected to the fourth terminal, and an upper cathode is connected to the first terminal. A lower anode is connected to the second terminal, and a lower cathode is connected to the third terminal. The third terminal and the fourth terminal are arranged so as to be able to be short-circuited outside of a package.

A double-stator switched reluctance motor includes an annular rotor, an outer stator disposed outside the rotor, and an inner stator disposed inside the rotor. Phases of the salient poles in a rotational direction of the rotor are different from each other in at least one of a set of first stator salient poles and second stator salient poles and a set of first rotor salient poles and second rotor salient poles.

Apparatus and methods are provided for operating an electric motor, comprising selectively energizing the coils of a stator having a plurality of stator teeth, each stator tooth having a said coil mounted thereon. The stator coils of a subset of the stator teeth are energized during a given time period to attract a corresponding rotor tooth into alignment with each of the stator teeth in the subset over the given time period. The stator coil of at least one stator tooth in the subset is energized during a portion of the given time period before the at least one stator tooth overlaps the corresponding rotor tooth.

A controller for a switched reluctance motor is provided. The switched reluctance motor includes a rotor, a stator, and a coil wound on the stator. The switched reluctance motor is mounted on a vehicle as a drive source for propelling the vehicle. The controller includes an electronic control unit. The electronic control unit is configured to execute first control for exciting the coil at a first current value in a first exciting range. The electronic control unit is configured to, when the electronic control unit determines that the vehicle is not able to start moving even when the electronic control unit executes the first control, execute second control for exciting the coil at a second current value larger than the first current value in a second exciting range narrower than the first exciting range.

A controller of an oil pressure control system for an automatic transmission, the system including: a manual valve having a sleeve and a spool and changing an oil passage to the automatic transmission; a detent lever having engagement grooves and positioning the spool; an engagement member including an engagement unit for the grooves and a bias unit biasing the engagement unit; and a motor rotating the detent lever, comprises: a shift range detecting unit; a range switch determining unit determining whether the shift range is switched; a temperature detecting unit; a temperature determining unit determining whether environmental temperature is lower than a predetermined temperature; and a power controlling unit supplying, to the motor, power for setting a maximum value of a rotary torque of rotating the detent lever to be a predetermined value when the shift range is switched and the environmental temperature is lower than the predetermined temperature.

A short pitched switched reluctance motor control apparatus comprising a voltage provider comprising a first coupling and a second coupling configured to be coupled to a phase winding of the switched reluctance motor for applying a voltage to drive current in the winding between the first and second coupling is disclosed. The apparatus further comprises a controller configured to apply a first voltage pulse to the first coupling, and to apply a second voltage pulse to the second coupling, wherein the start of the second pulse is delayed with respect to the start of the first pulse, and the end of the first pulse is delayed with respect to the end of the second pulse.

The invention relates to an apparatus and method for controlling the current flow of at least one phase winding of a switched reluctance motor during at least one dwell period of the motor, wherein the dwell period starts with a turn-on angle of the motor and ends with the turn-off angle of the motor, wherein the dwell period is divided in a first subinterval comprising a first reference current, a second subinterval comprising a second reference current and a third subinterval comprising a third reference current, wherein the flow of the first reference current is controlled based on at least one motor-efficiency parameter which depends on the efficiency of the motor, and wherein the flow of the second reference current is controlled based on at least one torque-parameter which depends on the torque of the motor to control the torque production of the motor.