IEEE Transactions on Industry Applications

A closed-form approximate formulation is proposed to establish a relationship between the uncontrolled generator (UCG) operation of interior permanent-magnet (IPM) motors at high speed and the constant power speed range (CPSR) and drive current capabilities. High-saliency IPM motors of the PM-assisted synchronous reluctance type are mainly considered in the analysis, since they are proved to have ... View full abstract»

This paper proposes a new rotor design for flux-intensifying interior permanent magnet synchronous machine (FI-IPM SM) that is more suitable for self-sensing control at zero/very low speed based on saliency-tracking methods and retains acceptable power conversion capability as compared to a traditional flux-weakening IPM SM (FW-IPM SM). Design steps for the rotor structure of the new machine are l... View full abstract»

The issue of noise emission from electric drives is becoming increasingly important. Motor manufacturers have to comply with certain standards in order to assure the high competitiveness of their products. At the same time, with today's variable speed drives, which are supplied with nonsinusoidal voltages, the issue of noise reduction has become more complex. This is because the influence of addit... View full abstract»

This paper presents a thermal analysis of a segmented stator winding design. As the thermal performance is one of the main factors limiting a machine's output capability, a thermal test on a complete prototype machine is an essential part of the design process. However, for the segmented stator winding design, a test-informed thermal analysis on a single stator tooth can be performed prior to the ... View full abstract»

The concept of memory is due to the fact that the magnetization level of permanent magnets (PMs) in the motor can be easily regulated by a temporary dc current pulse and then be memorized automatically. By incorporating this concept into the hybrid-field doubly salient PM (DSPM) motor, the resulting dc-excited memory motor can offer effective and efficient air-gap flux control. The purpose of this... View full abstract»

The growing interest in fault-tolerant drives requires new solutions avoiding the adoption of custom and expensive configurations. The machine with a dual three-phase winding is an interesting candidate. It is provided with two windings, each of them fed by one converter of half power. With a proper mechanical and electrical arrangement, the machine can be exactly a six-phase machine, obtaining hi... View full abstract»

A breakdown of the electrical insulation system causes catastrophic failure of the electrical machine and brings large process downtime losses. Preventive maintenance and online monitoring are some of the methods to improve the reliability and to reduce unscheduled downtime. One of the main reasons for the failure of the machine is the breakdown of the stator turn insulation. The offline surge tes... View full abstract»

This paper focuses on the optimization of a linear actuator by the “output space mapping (OSM)” method. The underlying objective of this work lies in the minimization of the time required for the achievement of this optimal design. Indeed, in addition to the sole costs of optimization processes strictly speaking, the time needed for the developpement of the models is taken into accou... View full abstract»

Fractional-slot concentrated windings (FSCW) have been gaining a lot of interest in permanent magnet (PM) synchronous machines. This is due to the advantages they provide including shorter nonoverlapping end turns, higher efficiency, higher power density, higher slot fill factor, lower manufacturing cost, better flux-weakening capability resulting in wider constant power versus speed range, and fa... View full abstract»

Pulsewidth-modulated (PWM) ac drives generate high differential-mode (DM) motor voltages due to the reflected wave phenomenon. The common-mode (CM) voltage produced by a PWM inverter also has fast transitions that result in high peak currents to ground. For low-power ac drives, this can present several issues, such as pump-up of the dc bus and failure of the power module due to high instantaneous ... View full abstract»

A simple analytical technique, which uses readily available datasheet parameters, is developed to model the low-current switching characteristics of insulated-gate bipolar transistors (IGBTs). Simulation and experimental results obtained using three differently rated inverters are presented to demonstrate the accuracy of the technique. The model is applied to compensate the nonlinear distortion, i... View full abstract»

This paper introduces a unified direct-flux vector control scheme that is suitable for sinusoidal ac motor drives. The ac drives considered here are induction motor, synchronous reluctance, and synchronous permanent-magnet (PM) motor drives, including interior and surface-mounted PM types. The proposed controller operates in stator flux coordinates: The stator flux amplitude is directly controlled... View full abstract»

Elimination of externally mounted position sensors and their associated cables is a goal for drive manufacturers. This paper addresses design methods of surface-permanent-magnet (SPM) synchronous machines for saliency-tracking self-sensing (position sensorless) position estimation. Machine spatial saliency is created by stator magnetic saturation due to the rotor zigzag leakage flux from SPMs. Usi... View full abstract»

This work approximates the selective harmonic elimination problem using artificial neural networks (ANNs) to generate the switching angles in an 11-level full-bridge cascade inverter powered by five varying dc input sources. Each of the five full bridges of the cascade inverter was connected to a separate 195-W solar panel. The angles were chosen such that the fundamental was kept constant and the... View full abstract»

This paper presents the experimental results of the independent drive characteristics of two three-phase induction motors (IMs) fed by a four-leg inverter (FLI). The FLI is a single inverter that can drive two three-phase ac motors independently. The inverter consists of four legs and two capacitors connected in a series. The U and V phases of both motors are connected in each leg, respectively, w... View full abstract»

This paper presents an alternative technique for the adaptive control of power electronic converter circuits. Specific attention is given to the adaptive control of a dc-dc converter. The proposed technique is based on a simple adaptive filter method and uses a one-tap finite impulse response (FIR) prediction error filter (PEF). The method is computationally efficient and based around a dichotomou... View full abstract»

A five-/nine-level twelve-switch inverter is described for three-phase high-speed electric machines having a low per-unit leakage reactance. By reducing the voltage blocking requirement of the semiconductors, the neutral-point-clamped (NPC) variant of the coupled inductor (CI) inverter topology (NPC-CI) is more suited to high dc bus voltages than the six-switch alternative (six-switch CI). Operati... View full abstract»

Consideration of the higher order time derivatives of voltage and current transitions in power semiconductor devices enables the specification of “S-shaped” switching waveforms which offer an improved tradeoff between high-frequency EMI generation and switching losses. In comparison with the widely used first-order derivative trapezoidal switching waveform approximation, Fourier anal... View full abstract»

This paper presents an intensive discussion on conducted electromagnetic interference (EMI) emissions from an inverter-driven air conditioner. Common-mode voltages produced by the pulsewidth-modulated (PWM) inverter may cause a high-frequency leakage current. The use of a spectrum analyzer and a line-impedance stabilization network (LISN) makes it possible to refer the leakage current in the time ... View full abstract»

This paper focuses on a new realization method of an emitter turn-off thyristor (ETO). The low-inductive requirements for the unity gain turn-off capability of a gate commutated thyristor (GCT) led to bulky driver stages directly attached to the device. This, combined with the need for electrolytic capacitors, inherently leads to mechanical and thermal design problems, which significantly limit th... View full abstract»

This paper investigates the operation of space-vector-based hysteresis current control in the synchronous reference frame (SRF) for grid-connected voltage source converters. The space-vector-based approach allows for the systematic application of zero-voltage vectors and prevents high switching frequencies caused by phase interaction. The average switching frequency can be minimized by always sele... View full abstract»

AC line reactors and dc link reactors are widely used in variable frequency drives (VFDs) to improve the drive performance such as reducing input harmonics, improving the input power factor, and protecting the drives from surges, etc. The effectiveness of both types of reactors in reducing input harmonics is affected by many factors, including the loading of the drives and the system source impeda... View full abstract»

The microsystem design approach of electric systems has the purpose to improve their safety, maintenance, operation, and reliability. The microsystem design approach can be applied to the case of marinas, where pleasure craft may be moored. Marinas require a structured architecture for the shore electrical power distribution system, which supplies power to distributed loads. In addition, the desig... View full abstract»