Linear motor

A linear motor comprising a first member including armature modules, a second member including permanent magnet modules, and a supporting mechanism,

• wherein each armature module has at least four salient poles projected from a ring-shaped magnetic body to the second member and coils winding round the salient poles, through which a single-phase current flows,
• each permanent magnet module has as many permanent magnets as a number of the salient poles included in each armature module,
• currents having a predetermined phase difference are applied to the armature modules such that a thrust according to a traveling magnetic field is generated in a unit composed of S armature modules and P (P is a number corresponding to a multiple of 2) permanent magnet modules arranged in a moving direction, and
• a stator corresponding to one of the first member and the second member is fixed to the supporting mechanism such that a mover corresponding to the other is moved by the thrust.