Demonstration Meeting Successful (continued) Cowie said the highlight of the event was the demonstration of actual castings at Formcast. Attendees broke out into four groups to ensure a close-up look at the process. “Judging from their reactions,” Cowie said, “the demonstration convinced them that casting copper rotors economically was now a reality.” Figure 2. Rotor I2R Losses – Copper vs. Aluminum (watts) hp kW Poles Al Cu Difference Reduction 4 3 4 221 92 129 -58% 5 3.7 4 - - - -38% 15 11 4 262 157 104 -40% 25 19 4 410 292 118 -40% Figure 2 demonstrates the reduction in I2R energy losses achieved by switching from aluminum to copper conductor bars. “The event was extremely successful,” Cowie summarized. “There was a lot of interaction among the participants. Through this type of interaction, the activity of the copper motor rotor project will devolve from CDA to individual manufacturers. We’re beginning to see the first of the manufacturers bringing this technology in-house.” As the project moves further toward commercialization, according to Cowie, CDA will continue to promote the copper motor rotor, but scale back on research and development, since the problem of cracking has been solved. The focus of the project will now be on demonstrations for individual factories. For information about scheduling an on-site presentation and consultation, contact Dr. Cowie at jcowie@cda.copper.org.

Update: Copper Motor Rotor is published monthly by the Copper Development Association Inc. to provide current information of interest to those in the electric motor and related industries. CDA assumes no responsibility or liability in connection with this publication and makes no warranties of any kind with respect to the information contained herein.