Comparison of MRAS and novel simple method for position estimation in PMSM drives

The control of a high performance permanent magnet synchronous motor drive needs accurate information on rotor angle and angular speed. Two methods to estimate the position angle and angular speed of a surface magnet motor without the use of mechanical motion sensors are compared in this paper. The proposed estimator is compared to the model reference adaptive system (MRAS) estimator, which is a well known method of estimating the angle and speed of the PMSM. The simple algorithms studied in this paper do not need any information about mechanical system of the motor. The applicability of the estimators for closed-loop, estimator based, feedback control was studied using simulations and measurements with a real PMSM drive.