A Reversible Position Sensorless Controlled Switched-Reluctance Motor Drive With Adaptive and Intuitive Commutation Tunings

Abstract

This paper presents a reversible position sensorless switched reluctance motor (SRM) drive with adaptive and intuitive commutation instant tunings. The narrow voltage pulses are injected into an unenergized phase winding via the PWM channel. The resulted amplitude modulated winding currents are sensed and signal processed to yield the observed Hall signal. No external injection circuit and the motor parameters are required. The estimated rotor speed is obtained from the observed Hall signal. The motor is first started in stepping motor mode, and then it is changed to the sensorless SRM mode as the speed is raised to a suited value. The smooth and fast starting as well as reversible operations are yielded. To improve the torque generating capability, an adaptive commutation tuning control scheme with the identified winding inductance is developed to set the commutation shift angle according to the observed speed, the winding current command, and observed inductance. Moreover, the static intuitive commutation tuning is further conducted in static period to pursuit maximum torque-per-ampere characteristics. Experimental evaluation shows that the developed position sensorless SRM drive possesses very smooth reversible operation and driving performance within a wide speed range, even higher than rated speed.