Mercedes‑Benz starts large‑scale production of electric axial flux motor

throwaway132448

Ah, another fantastic British innovator (YASA) having to realize its potential (and ultimately the downstream economic benefits of commercialisation) abroad. Brought to you by the only country to have a space programme and abandon it.

AndrewDucker

It would have been awesome if that article had, at any point, explained what an electric axial flux motor was, and why anyone might want one.

kenanfyi

I remember when YASA announced it and when MB bought them. Amazing technology and advancement in electric motor design. Good to see they somehow try to commercialize it.

eptcyka

Never become dependent on doing hideously complicated things. You will eventually struggle to choose to do something more efficient, as the european auto industry is currently displaying. The car where thid motor will be used will, given current market sentiment, be a massive flop. Here they are showing off how complex the manufacturing process is. Surely we’d all be better off with simpler and cheaper processes.

Urahandystar

Glad YASA's achievements are being realised but the UK really needs to get it act together so we can fully realise the next tech breakthough.

aitchnyu

Tangential, how much regen can this system support? For example, can a car with 200kW propulsion have a 400kW regen (Tesla has upto 65) and are cost effective like friction brakes?

wizardforhire

This is gonna be wild in a few years when these things are parted out the way tesla motors have been… Everything about these is crazy! If you’re not caught up https://youtu.be/m507ryWhc6c?si=Hq3dfjXYxEIlYzeo

rdksu

Only if they could mass produce flux capacitor.

ianpurton

The main benefit here seems to be smaller and lighter for the same power output.

jansan

Four years ago, when YASA's invention was discussed on HN, it attracted very little interest. Mercedes apparently saw more potential and decided to invest. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31701133 Inside Yasa: how a British firm is revolutionising electric cars (2 points | 0 comments)

krn1p4n1c

I would guess that hydro and other generator forms would benefit from this design as well? Personally I’d love to see this make it’s way into power tools and CNC motors.

latentframe

An interesting part here is probably manufacturing and not the motor itself : going from a prototype to something you can mass produce reliably is often the hard part

s08148692

Very cool. Good to see more axial flux motors in the wild - will be interesting to see if they become the new standard in future. With smaller material costs the cost to manufacture at scale could actually become lower than radial I expect radial will still dominate for at least another decade or so outside of premium performance focused cars. Radial has been battle-tested and proven. Axial still has a few more years to prove it's reliability in the field. Higher loads and stresses, tighter tolerances could make the axial motors less reliable overall especially at mass market trims. Mercedes is probably over-engineering for reliability and performance on the premium car Radial is also "good enough" for most applications. The efficiency, form factor and weight improvements of axial is nice, but they aren't the limiting factor. Radial is already highly efficient, reasonably light and small. The real level for weight is the battery

Waterluvian

That is one angry looking car.

DonsDiscountGas

Only slightly related but does anyone know anything about motors with magnetic bearings? As in, no contact or friction. I'm looking for a hardware project

bluebarbet

For a century Germany's comparative advantage has been [mechanical] engineering. As a European I want (need?) Germany to succeed. Ergo: more of this, please.

miohtama

Mercedes acquired Yasa (UK) couple of years ago and now getting up to the speed in the production. Here is a nice video that explains axial flux motors with a factory visit https://youtu.be/B2Hl4c1iZK0?si=VfDYARyuaPVj1nKm They are so, so, small.

small_model

10 years behind Tesla, they are doomed

rswail

This video explained to me what an axial flux motor is and how it's different to radial flux. Amazing what materials science achieving to get this sort of power as well as the engineering and manufacturing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCO633KE7RA

engineer_22

I am speculating but here might be reasons axial flux motors have advantage over radial flux motors: 1) torque: torque = applied force x length of the lever. Because the radial flux rotor must fit inside the stator, therefore radius << motor outside diameter. With the axial flux motor, the rotor is adjacent to the stator, therefore radius < motor outside diameter. Axial rotor radius > radial rotor radius. 2) space efficiency: in a radial flux motor you have 1 rotor, the coils arranged so that one end of the coil's magnetic field is useful to work on the rotor, the other end is not used. In an axial flux motor, (1) pancake rotor at each end of the coils, total (2) rotors, the coils can act on a rotor at each end. There is no free lunch here, to do useful work you still must provide more energy to the coil, but you can get the most from the space. There must be someone here with a better handle on the electromagnetism, please correct me where I err.