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A unified unsaturated-reluctance-based wide speed range sensorless control method for switched reluctance machines (SRMs) is proposed in this paper. Firstly, the sensitivity analysis of the estimated position to the possible reluctance calculation error is analyzed. This analysis reveals the feasible regions with low sensitivity and low risk of entering saturation. Then, the unsaturated reluctance in these feasible regions is obtained and modeled. A simple second-order rational expression is proposed to fit the highly nonlinear unsaturated reluctance curve. With this simple model, the rotor position can be analytically calculated only by solving a simple quadratic problem. Based on the above-presented analysis, a wide-speed range sensorless control is developed. The rotor position is universally estimated from the real-time reluctance value and the proposed analytical model. The high-frequency voltage injection and normal conduction phase are combined to calculate the phase reluctance over the wide-speed range. The concerns of calculating reluctance at the low-speed range are also discussed. A 5.1 kW four-phase 8/6 SRM is used to verify the proposed method. Various steady state and transient state experimental results prove the effectiveness of the proposed sensorless control method.

Electric vehicles require high-power machines, so reducing power loss becomes crucial. Compared to space vector modulation, synchronous optimal pulse width modulation (SOP) has several advantages in high-speed applications, like the capability to operate at a very low switching frequency with lower total harmonic distortion, and reduced losses. This article presents a comprehensive review after performing a systematic investigation on different inverter topologies, including two-level voltage source inverters and multilevel inverter topologies with SOP as the modulation scheme. Several optimal pulsewidth methods will be studied along with SOP design methods, including steady state and dynamic switching. More emphasis is given to the various challenges faced in implementing SOP, followed by future trends. IEEE

This paper presents a simple and practical method to estimate the lumped radial force characteristics for the switched reluctance machines (SRMs). Firstly, the relationship between the square root of the lumped radial force and the flux-linkage is discussed and analyzed. With the geometry data of the studied SRM, the above relationship under nominal airgap length and nominal material magnetic property conditions can be obtained through the finite element analysis (FEA) software. Since the radial flux density dominates the magnitude of the radial force and it concentrates on the overlapping area, the above relationship is analyzed to be roughly held when the airgap length and/or material magnetic property vary. Based on this relationship obtained from FEA and the actual measured flux-linkage characteristics, the lumped radial force can be easily reconstructed for the actual SRMs regardless of the possible airgap length variation and material magnetic property deviation during the manufacturing process. Simulation results on the 8/6 SRM and 12/8 SRM verify that the proposed method provides good radial force estimation results when the airgap length is reduced or increased up to 50%. Superior estimation results are also observed on the condition that the magnetic BH curve is linearly varied by ±25%. The accurate and simple radial force estimation method proposed in this paper provides a solid basis for the radial-force-shaping-based advanced control methods to suppress the acoustic noise.

The vibration/noise and torque ripple are two inherent issues for switched reluctance motors (SRMs), one of the effective methods to address these two issues is flattening both the total radial force and total torque. In this paper, an optimized quadratic-sharing-function-based radial force and torque simultaneous flattening method is proposed for SRMs. Firstly, the features of the radial force and torque characteristics are analyzed without considering saturation. Then, with these unique and specific features, four regions are defined to develop the simultaneous radial force and torque control method based on the linear sharing functions. To incorporate the saturation effects in the proposed method, the quadratic sharing functions are adopted. The proper parameters of the quadratic sharing functions and the region definition at different operating conditions are obtained through the genetic algorithm (GA) optimization. The switching angles and reference current of the conventional current chopping control (CCC) method are also optimized by GA for fair comparison purpose. Extensive simulation results are presented in this paper, and these results prove the effectiveness and superiority of the proposed method regarding the simultaneous radial force and torque control. © 2022 IEEE.

Synchronous optimal pulse-width modulation (SOPWM) is an effective solution to reduce switching frequency without increasing the current distortion. This method is widely used along with stator flux tracking in traction applications of induction motors. However, stator flux tacking is not an ideal control technique for permanent magnet synchronous motors (PMSMs). This paper studies SOPWM with stator current tracking for PMSM traction applications. Stator current tracking with SOPWM suffers poor steady-state performance when the PMSM operates around discontinuity of the switching angles due to the voltage disturbance generated from current harmonics. This problem is usually solved by using continuous switching angles. However, this approach brings more overall current distortion due to sub-optimal switching angles. To address this issue, a novel hysteresis control-based SOPWM scheme with continuous switching angles is proposed. Preliminary simulation results indicate that the proposed method can offer low current distortion compared to conventional and continuous SOPWMs. © 2022 IEEE.

In this article, a general-purpose low-speed position estimation scheme using pulse injection is proposed for sensorless switched reluctance motor (SRM) drives. For the conventional low-speed sensorless control methods, magnetic characteristics are often used for position estimation, but it requires offline measurement and reduces the generality of sensorless control algorithms. To solve the issue, a new position estimator based on a regional phase-locked loop (RPLL) is designed. The approach utilizes a self-commissioning process to capture the unsaturated inductance adaptively at the initial stage. The RPLL is then adopted to estimate the full-cycle rotor position from the idle-phase inductance during sensorless operation. The speed-reversible sensorless control capability is also realized by a simple heterodyne design. Furthermore, stability analyses and parameter design are given to prove the robust local stability and convergence. Finally, comparative experimental validation is conducted on a 5.5-kW 12/8 SRM setup to verify the proposed method's effectiveness under both no-load and load conditions.

High-speed position-sensorless control of switched reluctance motor (SRM) drives is often realized by searching a priori flux linkage lookup table. However, obtaining the nonlinear flux linkage characteristic requires time-consuming offline measurement and occupies large memory storage. To deal with this problem, this article proposes a new position estimation scheme for SRM drives without using any magnetic characteristics. This feature is achieved by using a quadrature flux estimator (QFE) that can extract the fundamental flux and its quadrature signal from the real-time calculated flux linkage. The flux bias and flux harmonics can also be suppressed by the QFE’s adaptive bandpass capability. Therefore, the proposed method can reduce the nonlinearity in SRM flux linkage and derive simple sine–cos position signals. Afterward, the rotor position and speed can be estimated from the orthogonal flux signals using a three-phase phase-locked loop. To baseline the advantages, comparative experimental validation with the conventional method is conducted on a three-phase 12/8 SRM test bench. The results show that the proposed scheme can achieve the same estimation accuracy as the conventional method even though no magnetic characteristics are used.

In this article, a low-ripple continuous control set (CCS) model predictive torque control (MPTC) method for switched reluctance machines (SRMs) is proposed. The inherent high nonlinearity of the SRMs makes it difficult to solve the optimization problem in the CCS MPTC algorithm analytically. To address this issue, an equivalent linear SRM model is adopted, and the cost function is also properly modified. Then, with the torque boundary values provided by executing the voltage vectors of an improved switching table, the optimization problem in the CCS MPTC method becomes simple and analytically solvable. The Lagrange multiplier method is employed to solve this optimization problem analytically and generate the optimum torque reference values for the active phases. Based on the estimated torque variation rates, the duty cycles for each phase are calculated. Extensive simulation and experimental tests are carried out in a four-phase 8/6 SRM setup. These testing results reveal that the proposed CCS MPTC method shows much lower torque ripples and current ripples in a wide speed range with a low computational burden than the existing finite control set MPTC methods.

In this article, a novel model predictive torque control (MPTC) method for switched reluctance machines (SRMs) is proposed based on the equivalent linear SRM model and the improved switching table. First, an improved switching table with only six switching states is developed based on the inductance characteristics. The adoption of this improved switching table not only reduces the computational burden by 25% but also improves the torque control performance and system efficiency at high-speed region. However, the look-up-table (LUT) based MPTC methods suffer from occupying numerous storage space. To ease this issue, the simple linear SRM model is utilized. The flux-linkage and torque equivalent transformations are introduced to address the difference between the linear and nonlinear SRM models. With these transformations, the MPTC realized on the linear SRM model is proposed. Compared to 1530 storage units consumption to store three two-dimensional (2-D) LUTs in the LUT-based MPTC methods, the proposed method only occupies 228 storage units. Experimental results on an 8/6 SRM setup verify that the proposed method effectively eliminates the commutation torque ripple with lower execution time, less storage space, and improves the torque control performance at a highspeed range compared with the conventional LUT-based method.

Optimal pulse patterns (OPPs) have many advantages for permanent magnet synchronous motor (PMSM) drives, such as low switching frequency, and low current harmonic distortion at medium to high speeds. Selective harmonic mitigation is an effective approach to generate optimal switching pulse patterns by minimizing the entire harmonic content instead of eliminating individual harmonics. A proper offline optimization method is required for selective harmonic mitigation to maximize the power utilization of PMSMs. This paper discusses two optimization techniques: 1) genetic algorithm (GA) and 2) FMINCON solver for obtaining the OPPs for a two-level inverter. Both the methods are studied with different pulse number to calculate the optimal switching angles that can provide less total harmonic distortion (THD) of phase currents. Comparative simulations are performed to validate the effectiveness of the optimization approach and it is found that FMINCON solver can optimize the switching angles better than GA with an approximately 4% reduction in the phase current THD. © 2022 IEEE.

Switched reluctance motors (SRMs) are promising traction machine candidates for electric vehicle powertrains and industrial driving systems due to their rugged construction and high efficiency. Precise speed and torque control of SRMs require real-time rotor position information from mechanical position sensors. With the advantages of lower costs and position sensor fault-tolerant capability, various position-sensorless control strategies have been developed for SRM drives in the past decades. This article presents a review of the state-of-the-art sensorless control schemes over a wide speed range. Low-speed methods based on high-frequency pulse voltage injection and high-speed methods based on fundamental excitation are summarized to give readers a systematic categorization. An in-depth comparison of major sensorless control algorithms in estimation accuracy, robustness, universality, and parameter sensitivity is presented. Finally, the existing challenges and future trends are discussed.