The invention of induction motors permanently altered the course of human civilization. This hundred-year-old motor—invented by the great scientist Nikola Tesla—is the most common motor type, even today. In fact, about 50 percent of global electric power consumption is due to induction motors. Let’s get into the workings of induction motors, or more specifically, into Nikola Tesla’s genius thinking.
An induction motor or asynchronous motor is an AC electric motor in which the electric current in the rotor needed to produce torque is obtained by electromagnetic induction from the magnetic field of the stator winding. Watch the video from Lesics for more info:
In both induction and synchronous motors, the AC power supplied to the motor’s stator creates a magnetic field that rotates in synchronism with the AC oscillations. Whereas a synchronous motor’s rotor turns at the same rate as the stator field, an induction motor’s rotor rotates at a somewhat slower speed than the stator field.
Advertisement
The induction motor stator’s magnetic field is therefore changing or rotating relative to the rotor. This induces an opposing current in the induction motor’s rotor, in effect the motor’s secondary winding, when the latter is short-circuited or closed through an external impedance.The rotating magnetic flux induces currents in the windings of the rotor, in a manner similar to currents induced in a transformer’s secondary winding(s)./wikipedia
