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2 Alternator questions

Asked by: 2007 views General Aviation

Hi,

Do most general aviation alternators have a rotor that rotates inside a stator/armature, I don't know the difference, or a stator that rotates around the rotor?

Also, do alternators have a rectifier to charge the battery?

Thank you.

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1 Answers



  1. crossaint on Sep 12, 2016

    the rotor rotates, the stator stands statically. The armature is the copper coil producing the magnetic field. The tricky thing is that the field is generated in the rotor as the current to create the field is much smaller then the created one (otherwise it would be useless 🙂
    So the coil in the middle of the alternator is rotated by the motor and creates voltages in the three fixed stator coils. Six diodes are used to rectify the currents into direct current.
    The alternator controller adjust the field current into the rotor such that the generated voltage is within the design limits.

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