Synchronous or stepping motor with equal-torque stepping

Claim 1

An electric motor, comprising: two coaxially arranged adjacent stator sections, each section comprising an outer disc, a middle disc and a stator coil disposed therebetween, said middle discs being adjacent one another, and a rotor comprising a shaft having an axis, mounted for rotation coaxially within said stator sections, and a plurality of rotor discs, each rotor disc being disposed concentrically with a stator section, each of said discs having a plurality of teeth, equiangularly spaced so as to define a tooth-to-tooth pitch, said pitch being identical for all said discs, teeth on a rotor disc being aligned to cooperate with respective teeth on a stator disc aligned therewith, defining a rotor-to-stator air gap, at least one rotor disc and a stator section associated therewith forming a magnetic system having two rotor-to-stator air gaps, and a permanent magnet mounted coaxially on said shaft between the rotor disc which cooperates with the middle disc of one stator section and the rotor disc which cooperates with the middle disc of the other stator section, said magnet being axially magnetized to provide a constant magnetic flux which passes along a path through said plurality of rotor discs, across one of said rotor-to-stator air gaps, through each of said stator sections, and across another rotor-to-stator air gap to the rotor, a non-magnetic gap between adjacent stator middle discs, said gap extending radially outward from the vicinity of the stator teeth of said middle discs to a butt joint adjacent the circumference of said middle discs, and through which said constant flux passes between said sections, said gap raising the reluctance of the flux path for said constant magnetic flux without changing the reluctance of either system, thereby minimizing difference in flux passing across the two rotor-to-stator air gaps of a magnetic system whose coil is unenergized when the other coil is energized and said rotor is in a stable position with respect to the teeth of the discs of the stator section whose coil is energized, said butt joint providing low reluctance path means between said adjacent stator sections.