Realization of a sensorless speed controller for permanent magnet synchronous motor drives based on field programmable gate array technology

This article presents a hybrid sensorless speed controller for permanent magnet synchronous motor drives using field programmable gate array technology. The I-f startup strategy is applied to permanent magnet synchronous motor drives at the startup condition and then it will smoothly switch to extended Kalman filter-based sensorless field-oriented control at the adequate condition. The I-f startup is a simple strategy and suitable for the low-speed sensorless control without initial rotor position estimation and machine parameters estimation. Meanwhile, the extended Kalman filter-based sensorless field-oriented control is appropriate for the medium- and high-speed sensorless control. Therefore, combining two approaches, the sensorless permanent magnet synchronous motor can be smoothly operated from a standstill to a high-speed condition. In this article, first, the mathematical modeling of permanent magnet synchronous motor is introduced. Also, the I-f startup strategy is conducted, and the rotor position estimation algorithm by extended Kalman filter is derived. Second, a very high-speed integrated circuit hardware description language is presented to describe the behavior of the adopted estimation and control algorithm. This application codes have been confirmed using Simulink and ModelSim co-simulation. Finally, a field programmable gate array-based experimental system is utilized to verify the correctness and effectiveness of the proposed hybrid sensorless speed controller for a permanent magnet synchronous motor and a ceiling fan motor.