Investigation of Signal Injection Methods for Fault Detection of PMSM Drives

Inter-turn short-circuit fault (ISF) is a typical incipient fault of the PMSM, which could be detected by high frequency (HF) signal injection method with high resolution. However, the performance comparisons and key parameter selections for various signal injection methods remain untouched. In this paper, different HF injection signals, including rotating high frequency voltage (RHFV), pulsating high frequency voltage (PHFV) and rotating high frequency current (RHFC), are put forward and compared by extracting the HF fault features in zero-sequence voltage space. Since the RHFV injection method has the advantages of high resolution and simple control structure, the fault features under the RHFV signal injection with different parameters are studied. In order to obtain ISF detection resolution as high as possible, the frequency of the RHFV signal is suggested to be near half the PWM frequency of the PMSM inverter. Simulations and experiments are carried out and the results verify the effectiveness of the theoretical analysis.