532

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 52, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

An MRAS-Based Sensorless High-Performance Induction Motor Drive With a Predictive Adaptive Model
Maurizio Cirrincione, Member, IEEE, and Marcello Pucci, Member, IEEE
AbstractThis paper presents a new model reference adaptive system (MRAS) speed observer for high-performance eld-oriented control induction motor drives based on adaptive linear neural networks. It is an evolution and an improvement of an MRAS observer presented in the literature. This new MRAS speed observer uses the current model as an adaptive model discretized with the modied Euler integration method. A linear neural network has been then designed and trained online by means of an ordinary least-squares (OLS) algorithm, differently from that in the literature which employs a nonlinear backpropagation network (BPN) algorithm. Moreover, the neural adaptive model is employed here in prediction mode, and not in simulation mode, as is usually the case in the literature, with a consequent quicker convergence of the speed estimation, no need of ltering the estimated speed, higher bandwidth of the speed loop, lower estimation errors both in transient and steady-state operation, better behavior in zero-speed operation at no load, and stable behavior in eld weakening. A theoretical analysis of some stability issues of the proposed observer has also been developed. The OLS MRAS observer has been veried in numerical simulation and experimentally, and in comparison with the BPN MRAS one presented in the literature. Index TermsArticial neural networks (ANNs), electrical drives, eld-oriented control (FOC), induction motor, least squares, model adaptive reference systems (MRASs), sensorless drives.

Space vector of the rotor ux-linkages in the stator reference frame. Direct and quadrature component of the rotor ux linkage in the stator reference frame. stator inductance. Rotor inductance. Total static magnetizing inductance. Resistance of a stator phase winding. Resistance of a rotor phase winding. Transient time constant of the machine. Stator time constant. Rotor time constant. Total leakage factor. Number of pole pairs. Angular rotor speed (in mechanical angles). Angular rotor speed (in electrical angles per second). Sampling time of the control system. I. INTRODUCTION

LIST OF SYMBOLS Space vector of the stator voltages in the stator reference frame. Direct and quadrature components of the stator voltages in the stator reference frame. Space vector of the stator currents in the stator reference frame. Direct and quadrature components of the stator currents in the stator reference frame. Direct and quadrature components of the stator currents in the rotor-ux oriented reference frame. Space vector of the stator ux-linkages in the stator reference frame. Direct and quadrature component of the stator ux linkage in the stator reference frame.
Manuscript received May 9, 2003; revised September 9, 2004. Abstract published on the Internet January 13, 2005. The authors are with the Section of Palermo, Istituto di Studi sui Sistemi Intelligenti per lAutomazione (I.S.S.I.A.-C.N.R.), 90128 Palermo, Italy (e-mail: m.cirrincione@ieee.org; marcello.pucci@ieee.org). Digital Object Identier 10.1109/TIE.2005.844247

VER THE LAST few years many attempts have been made to compute the speed signal of induction machines for reliable high-performance vector and direct torque-controlled drives. In this respect, the literature is very rich and dates back from [2] through many other classical works such as [2][24]. References [7] and [8] describe in detail all recent and most widespread solutions, most of which depend, however, on the machine parameters, which are variable because of temperature, saturation levels, frequency, and so on. In general, the parameter mismatch as well as the noise in the input signals of the ux model cause the conventional speed estimation techniques to fail in very-low-speed operation in a speed-sensorless high-performance induction motor drive. Therefore, several other techniques have been developed, such as open-loop estimators using improved schemes [4][6], [8], estimators using either saliency effects or spatial saturation stator third harmonic voltage [4][6], [8], model reference adaptive systems (MRASs) [1], [9], [15][17], adaptive observers [12][14] and those estimators using articial intelligence [18], [19], [21], [22], in particular, neural networks and fuzzy logic systems. These last two techniques seem to be among the simplest and most powerful [1][3], in particular, when working together [8], [15][17], [20]. Remarkable works have been published in application both to eld-oriented control (FOC) and direct

0278-0046/$20.00 2005 IEEE

CIRRINCIONE AND PUCCI: MRAS-BASED SENSORLESS HIGH-PERFORMANCE INDUCTION MOTOR

533

torque control (DTC) [9][11], [20], [23] induction motor drives. References [4][6] propose an open-loop speed estimator based on the stator and rotor voltage equations of the induction machine in the stator reference frame and apply it to a stator-ux-oriented vector-controlled induction motor drive. In particular, it proposes a new methodology which eliminates the dc drift problem due to open-loop integration typical of open-loop ux estimators and a new stator resistance online estimation algorithm. Reference [23] applies an MRAS closed-loop ux observer (CLFO) based on a proportionalintegral (PI)-controller-based minimization of the cross product between the rotor uxes, estimated, respectively, by the voltage model and the current model. In this observer, which is an evolution of [24], the closed-loop topology provides the necessary feedback for the voltage model integration, so that in the voltage model a low-pass (LP) lter is not required to cancel the dc drift, differently from [1]. However, this causes a bad behavior of the observer at low speeds: in fact, as clearly written in [23], on the one hand the current model has no dc constant output and, therefore, the ux-coupling PI controller ensures zero dc level at the output. On the other hand, as frequency approaches zero, the cross product also approaches zero and speed estimate forcing is lost. A mechanical model of the machine for compensating this aspect is then to be used at the expense, however, of an increase in the complexity of the observer. Moreover, this observer requires two coordinate transformations and the ux estimation is dependant on the speed estimation, differently from [1]. In the end, the lowest limit of this observer is not shown explicitly. Reference [9] applies an MRAS speed estimator both to a classical DTC and to a DTC space-vector modulation (SVM). In particular, the MRAS speed estimator structure is the same as in [1] which is based on the PI-based minimization of the cross product between the rotor uxes estimated, respectively, by the reference and the adaptive models. However, differently from [1], the reference model is not a simple voltage model estimator, but a full-order stator and rotor ux observer, containing both the voltage and the current models, while the adaptive model is simply the current model. Thus, this speed estimator employs the current model twice, rstly in the reference model (in the rotor ux oriented reference frame) and secondly in the adaptive model (in the stator reference frame). Also here the reference model requires two coordinate transformations. The limit of this speed estimator, as presented in those papers, is 30 r/min but only the estimated speed is shown at that reference speed, while no corresponding measured speed, no speed estimation error, and no zero-speed operation are shown. References [10] and [11] apply an open-loop speed estimator respectively to a classical DTC and a DTC-SVM and to a DTC sliding mode (SM). In both articles the speed is open-loop estimated on the basis of the difference between the angular speed of the rotor ux linkage and the angular slip speed. In particular, [10] presents a full-order stator and rotor ux observer, which contains both the voltage and the current models and is practically an evolution of [9]: the lowest presented speed limit of this estimator is 30 r/min by correctly showing both the estimated and measured speed at that speed reference; how-

ever, zero-speed operation is not shown. Also, [11] presents a full-order stator and rotor ux observer, which contains both the voltage and the current models and is also an evolution of [9] but which is based on the sliding-mode techniques: the lowest speed limit of this estimator is not explicitly shown, while only zero-speed operation at rated load is shown; zero-speed operation at no load is not shown. In particular, [15][17] present an MRAS speed observer which is an evolution of [1] and minimizes the error between rotor uxes estimated respectively with a reference and an adaptive ux model, and then they apply it to an FOC. Like in [1] it employs, as a reference model, the voltage model of the induction machine and the open-loop integration is performed by an LP lter. However, it uses the adaptive model, by rearranging the rotor equations of the machine so that a multilayer perceptron can be employed. On this basis, these articles exploit the classical backpropagation network (BPN) algorithm for the online training of the neural network to estimate the rotor speed. In [17] the observer is veried also experimentally, even if neither the lowest speed limit of the observer nor the zero-speed operation, at no load and at load, are presented. This paper proposes an improvement of the MRAS articial-neural-network (ANN)-based speed observer presented in [17], for basically two reasons. First it does not use the BPN neural network but an ADaptive LInear neural NEtwork (ADALINE), since the problem to be solved is linear: it is in fact questionable to use a nonlinear method like the BPN algorithm which causes local minima, paralysis of the neural network, need of two heuristically chosen parameters, initialization problems, and convergence problems. In [17] this linearity problem has been recognized, but the minimization has been performed with a gradient-descent dependent also from the momentum, which is not necessary. Second, the adaptive model in [17] is used in simulation mode, which means that its outputs are fed back recursively. In this paper, in contrast to this, a modied adaptive model is used as a predictor, without feedbacks, no need of ltering the estimated signal, and resulting in higher accuracy both in transient and steady-state operation. Moreover, differently from [17], a stable behavior in eld weakening is achieved, which is not the case of the adaptive model used in simulation mode, as demonstrated also theoretically in the paper. In this paper the BPN algorithm presented in [17] is compared experimentally to the presented speed observer and the improvements achieved with the MRAS OLS observer are emphasized. II. SENSORLESS FOC DRIVE The MRAS ANN-based speed observer has been implemented experimentally in an FOC induction motor drive. In particular, a voltage direct rotor-ux-oriented vector control has been implemented in which current control is performed at the eld reference frame level [8]. Fig. 1 shows the block diagram of the FOC sensorless induction motor drive, as implemented for the experimental verication. The control system has ve control loops, three on the direct axis and two on the quadrature axis. All the loops of the control system (current, ux, voltage, and speed) are performed at the

534

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 52, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

Fig. 1. Block diagram of the FOC algorithm.

sampling frequency kHz. The rotor ux linkage and the rotor speed are controlled by closed loops. Speed control is achieved by employing a PI controller for processing the speed error resulting from the comparison between the reference and the speed estimated by the MRAS ANN Speed Observer block (described in detail in Section III). The feedback on determines the secondary loop in which in which a PI controller processes the current error. On the direct axis the voltage is controlled at a constant value to make the drive automatically work in the eld weakening region. Inside the loop are respectively the rotor ux-linkage loop and the loop. The rotor ux linkage is controlled by employing a PI controller, processing the ux error between the reference ux and that estimated by the above mentioned block. The block vector modulation performs the modulation of the voltage-source inverter (VSI). In particular, the VSI is driven by an asynchronous SVM algorithm with a switching frequency kHz. This frequency has been selected as much as half the sampling frequency of all acquired signals to limit the ripple on the stator current. The implemented SVM algorithm permits the generation of any voltage vector inside the inverter hexagon and, therefore, the full exploitation of the dc-link voltage capability. In particular, in a modulation period , each command signal to the upper devices of the three legs of the inverter must have the following time length: (1) with

III. MRAS ANN-BASED SPEED OBSERVER In the MRAS speed observation scheme proposed here the reference model is based on the well-known stator equations of the induction motor [8], while the adaptive model is a linear ANN. In particular, the reference model is described by the following voltage stator equations (voltage model) of the induction motor in the stator reference frame:

(3)

For explanation of the symbols, see the List of Symbols at the beginning of the paper. The voltage model employs, to perform open-loop integration, LP lters with a low cutoff frequency instead of pure integrators. The adaptive model is based on the well-known voltage rotor equations (current model) in the stator reference frame

(4)

Equation (4) can also be written in the following manner: (5) where

(2) is the duration of the signal command to the upper where device of the inverter connected to the phase in a modulation period is the reference voltage on the phase , and is the dc-link voltage of the inverter. In the experimental application, a protection time of 2 s has been set and an algorithm which compensates the protection time has been adopted.

CIRRINCIONE AND PUCCI: MRAS-BASED SENSORLESS HIGH-PERFORMANCE INDUCTION MOTOR

535

(a)

(b) Fig. 2. (a) Block diagram of the ANN MRAS BPN observer (adaptive model in simulation mode). (b) Block diagram of the ANN MRAS observer (adaptive model in prediction mode).

Its corresponding discrete model is, therefore, given by

, the simple forward Euler method is obtained, which if gives the following nite-difference equation: (6) (8)

is generally computed by truncating its power series expansion, i.e.,

(7)

where marks the variables estimated with the adaptive model and is the current time sample. A neural network can reproare the weights of the duce these equations, where neural networks dened as: is the sampling time of the control system,

536

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 52, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

Fig. 2. (Continued.) (c) Block diagram of the ANN MRAS observer with modied Euler adaptive model (adaptive model in prediction mode).

is the three-phase magnetizing inductance of the motor, is is the rotor speed in electrical anrotor time constant, and gles. The ANN has, thus, four inputs and two outputs [15][17]. In the ANN, the weights and are kept constant to their is adopted online. These values computed ofine while only equations are the same as those obtained in [17], and the corresponding MRAS-based speed estimation scheme is represented in Fig. 2(a). It is clear from Fig. 2(a) that the adaptive model is characterized by the feedback of delayed estimated rotor ux components to the input of the neural network, which means that the adaptive model employed in [17] is in simulation mode [25]. Moreover, in [17] the adaptive model is tuned online (training) by means of a BPN algorithm, which is, however, nonlinear in its nature with the consequent drawbacks (local minima, heuristics in the choice of the network parameters, paralysis, convergence problems, and so on). On the contrary, in this paper the adaptive model employs an ADALINE and, differently from [17], the values of the rotor ux-linkage components at the input of the ANN come from the reference model, and not from the adaptive one; this means that the ANN is employed in prediction and not in simulation mode [25]. The reasons why a linear least-square algorithm is more suitable than a nonlinear one, such as the BPN, have been already highlighted. Furthermore, the employment of the adaptive model as a predictor instead of a simulator leads to a quicker convergence of the algorithm, a higher bandwidth of the speed control loop, a better behavior at zero speed, lower speed estimation errors both in transient and steady-state conditions and to a far more stable behavior of the estimator,

in particular, in the eld-weakening region, as it will be clearly explained in Sections IV and V. In this respect, two schemes can be proposed. The rst is derived from (4) by simply Euler integration, and the second by modied Euler integration. These are shown in the following. A. Euler Integration Equation (8) can be written in the following matrix form, taking into consideration the employment of the adaptive model as a predictor:

(9) This is a classical matrix equation of the type , is called a data matrix, is called an where is the scalar unknown, observation vector, and solvable by means of any least-squares technique ordinary least squares OLS data ordinary least squares DLS total ordinary least squares . In this application a classical OLS algorithm in a recursive form has been employed; see [26] for a detailed description of the adopted algorithm. Fig. 2(b) shows the block diagram of the corresponding MRAS OLS speed observer. B. Modied Euler Integration A more efcient integration method is given by the so-called modied Euler integration, which also takes into consideration the values of the variables in two previous time steps [26]. From (4) discrete-time equations (10) can be

CIRRINCIONE AND PUCCI: MRAS-BASED SENSORLESS HIGH-PERFORMANCE INDUCTION MOTOR

537

obtained, as shown at the bottom of the page. Also in this case, a neural network can reproduce these equations, where are the weights of the neural networks dened as: . From (10), matrix equation (11) is obtained in prediction mode, as shown at the bottom of the page. Fig. 2(c) shows the block diagram of the corresponding MRAS speed observer. Because of its better numerical efciency (see Section IV), this scheme will be adopted for the experimental phase in the following. IV. SIMULATION MODE AND PREDICTION MODE: MODIFIED EULER AGAINST SIMPLE EULER Some considerations should be made, however, on the use of the simulation mode to fully justify the use of the adaptive model in prediction mode. This section will also show that, even in simulation mode, the modied Euler integration tuned with the OLS method gives better performance in comparison with the results obtainable by using the simple Euler integration method trained either by the OLS or by the BPN. First, it will be shown that, by using the simple Euler method in prediction mode, better results are obtainable as far as stability is concerned than by using the same Euler integration trained by a BPN in simulation mode. Then, the improvement achieved by using the modied Euler integration is shown. The adaptive model can be used either as a simulator or as a predictor. When used as a simulator, the process output, that is, the rotor ux linkage, is delayed and then used as an input. In case the simple Euler integration method is used, the corresponding simulator model is described as follows: (12) where is the rotor linkage ux estimated by the adaptive model. This means that the transfer function in the domain is

stands for transform which has one pole where , and one zero at the origin of the domain. For stability reasons, the poles of the transfer function must lie within the unit circle in the domain. However, it should be noted that, while the real part of the pole is constant and less than one, because , its imaginary part depends on the rotor speed . This means that there is a critical value of the rotor speed which causes instability of the system. More precisely, the following relationship must be satised: (14) By solving for this inequality and recalling the meaning of it results that ,

(15) This relationship shows that the drive goes into instability for increasing values of the rotor speed. From (14), it also results that

that is, the sampling time has an upper limit for stability if the motor runs at a dened angular speed. For instance, for the motor at hand whose rated speed is 314 electrical rad/s and s, this upper limit for the sampling time is 0.15 ms. Conversely, (15) shows that if a sampling time of 0.1 ms is employed, which is the case under study, the highest limit of the speed is 385 electrical rad/s (Fig. 3(a) upper gure), which implies that the speed can be increased to as much as 18% of the rated speed and not over this limit, with resulting difculties in using the drive in the eld-weakening region. To overcome this difculty the adaptive model should be used as a predictor, that is, the delayed outputs of the reference model are used as inputs to the adaptive model. In this case, no feedback exists and no stability problems occur. The predictor model is then described as follows:

(13)

where is the delayed output of the reference model, that is, the rotor ux linkage estimated by the reference ux. The simple Euler method was obtained by using in (7). is chosen in (7). Better stability results can be obtained if

(10)

(11)

538

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 52, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

(a) Fig. 4. Rotor ux amplitude estimation with the current model integrated with the Euler and modied Euler methods (simulation test with current model used in simulation mode).

simulation, the actual speed has been used in the ux model, so the mismatch between the estimation with the two methods is caused only by the discretization methods. The simple Euler causes a substantial error at steady state (as much as 40%). This problem can be avoided either by using a simple Euler integration in prediction mode or by using a modied Euler integration either in simulation or in prediction mode. In this last case, however, the use of the prediction mode results in better accuracy in rotor ux estimation, and higher speed-loop bandwidth and a better performance at zero speed as shown in the experimental results in Section VI.
(b) Fig. 3. (a) Amplitude of the poles in simple Euler integration with the approximated exponential function with n = 1 and n = 2. (b) Amplitude of the poles with the modied Euler integration.

V. DESCRIPTION OF THE TEST SETUP The OLS MRAS ANN-based speed observer has been tested in simulation and experimentally on a suitable test setup. The test setup consists of the following [35]: three-phase induction motor with rated values shown in Table I; dc machine for loading the induction machine with rated values shown in Table II; electronic power converter: three-phase diode rectier and VSI composed of three IGBT modules without any control system, of rated power 7.5 kVA; electronic acdc converter for supplying the dc machine; electronic card with voltage sensors (model LEM LV 25-P) and current sensors (model LEM LA 55-P) for monitoring the instantaneous values of the stator phase voltages and currents; voltage sensor (model LEM CV3-1000) for monitoring the instantaneous value of the dc-link voltage; incremental encoder (model RS 256-499, 2500 pulses per round), only for comparison measurements; dSPACE card (model DS1103) with a PowerPC 604e at 400 MHz and a oating-point digital signal processor (DSP) TMS320F240. Fig. 5 shows the schematics of the test bench.

Then, the speed stability limit increases as shown in Fig. 3(a), bottom gure. This approximation has been at least used in [17] to avoid the stability problems in simulation mode. It should be emphasized that this last method implies at least the online computation of the square of the matrix, which makes this method too cumbersome for online applications. Better results, at the expense of a slight increase of computation in comparison with the simple Euler method, can be obtained with the modied Euler method [26]. In this case, a similar analysis of stability shows that two poles of the transfer function vary with speed, but the resulting speed stability limit is much higher than that obtained with the simple Euler method, thus allowing the exploitment of the eld-weakening region [Fig. 3(b)]. Moreover, the use of the modied Euler integration causes a strong increase in the accuracy of the computation of the rotor ux magnitude at rotor speeds different from zero. Fig. 4 shows the amplitude of the real rotor ux as well as the rotor ux estimated with the simple Euler integration and with the modied Euler integration when the machine is rst magnetized and then is given a speed reference of 100 rad/s. In this numerical

CIRRINCIONE AND PUCCI: MRAS-BASED SENSORLESS HIGH-PERFORMANCE INDUCTION MOTOR

539

TABLE I PARAMETERS OF THE INDUCTION MOTOR

Fig. 5.

Block diagram of the test setup. TABLE II PARAMETERS OF THE DC MACHINE

VI. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS The MRAS ANN-based observer has been veried numerically in simulation and applied experimentally to the test bench described in Section V. Simulations have been performed in the Matlab-Simulink environment. With regard to the experimental tests the speed observer as well as the whole control algorithm have been implemented by software on the DSP of the dSPACE board by employing the Matlab-Simulink Real Time WorkshopReal Time Interface environment. A suitable virtual instrument has also been properly developed to manage the drive and monitor all the electrical and mechanical signals of the motor online, e.g., the rotor speed, the dc-link voltage and the stator voltages and currents. In particular, the speed observer has been tested in both the FOC schemes described in Fig. 2(a) and (c) to make comparisons with the algorithm in [17]. For control purposes, the estimated speed has been fed back and instantaneously compared with the measured one to compute the speed error at each

instant and in each working condition. The phase voltages have been computed on the basis of the instantaneous measurement of the dc-link voltage and the switching state of the inverter [8]. An algorithm which compensates the dead time of the inverter has been adopted. Finally, the sampling frequency of the signals has been set to 10 kHz. Tests have been performed to verify the goodness of the proposed OLS MRAS speed observer and each test has been compared with the BPN MRAS observer of [17]; then, the improvements achieved with the OLS MRAS speed observer in the different working conditions are presented and discussed. 1) Experimental Test 1: Stability Behavior in Field-Weakening: As explained in Section V, if the adaptive model is simply discretized with the forward simple Euler method and used in simulation mode, that is, (8) is used; the MRAS BPN observer has an unstable behavior above a certain threshold speed which depends on the sampling time of the control system. In the system under study, with a sampling time of 10 s, this threshold speed is 192 rad/s in mechanical angles. In [17], to overcome this problem, an approximated adaptive (see Sections III and IV), which, model is used with however, increases the maximum speed at which the observer has a stable behavior at the expense of higher computational burden. Fig. 6 shows the reference, the real, and the estimated speeds, obtained in numerical simulation, with the MRAS BPN observer where the adaptive model is the current mode discretized with the simple forward Euler method and used in

540

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 52, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

Fig. 6. Estimated and measured speed in eld weakening, BPN MRAS observer with the discrete Euler current model (simulation).

Fig. 8. Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a speed reversal in eld weakening, OLS MRAS observer (experiment).

(a)

Fig. 9. Rotor ux and i during the speed reversal in eld weakening, OLS MRAS observer (experiment).

(b) Fig. 7. (a) Estimated and measured speed in eld weakening, BPN MRAS observer with the approximate current model and  = 0:003 (simulation). (b) Estimated and measured speed in eld weakening, BPN MRAS observer with the approximate current model and  = 0:0008 (simulation). Fig. 10. Measured and estimated speed before and after ltering during a step reference of 100 rad/s, BPN MRAS observer (experiment).

simulation mode, during two speed step references, respectively, at 100 and 200 rad/s. It clearly shows that, when the

speed reaches about 200 rad/s, the drive becomes unstable, as expected. The same test has also been done in numerical simulation by employing the MRAS BPN observer, with the

CIRRINCIONE AND PUCCI: MRAS-BASED SENSORLESS HIGH-PERFORMANCE INDUCTION MOTOR

541

(a)

(b) Fig. 11. (a) Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a speed reversal from 100 to 100 rad/s, OLS MRAS observer (experiment). (b) Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a speed reversal from 100 to 100 rad/s, BPN MRAS observer (experiment).

approximated adaptive model ( ) of [17] in simulation mode. Fig. 7(a) and (b) shows the reference, the real and the estimated speeds during two speed step references, respectively, at 100 and 200 rad/s, obtained with two different values of the

learning rate of the BPN neural network. These graphs clearly show that with higher values of , the drive at 200 rad/s tends to approach instability with a large estimation error and with enormous oscillations of the estimated speed. On the contrary,

542

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 52, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

(a)

(b) Fig. 12. (a) Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a speed reversal from 50 to 50 rad/s, OLS MRAS observer (experiment). (b) Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a speed reversal from 50 to 50 rad/s, BPN MRAS observer (experiment).

with lower values of , the estimation is almost correct down to 200 rad/s, while the estimated speed is far from the real one below the rated speed (at 100 rad/s), because of the slow convergence of the algorithm. It should be noted again, however,

that this better stability behavior in eld weakening, obtained with the approximated adaptive model, is traded off with a higher computation burden required by the adaptive model itself, because of the need of transcendent sin/cos functions.

CIRRINCIONE AND PUCCI: MRAS-BASED SENSORLESS HIGH-PERFORMANCE INDUCTION MOTOR

543

(a)

(b) Fig. 13. (a) Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a speed reversal from 10 to 10 rad/s, OLS MRAS observer (experiment). (b) Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a speed reversal from 10 to 10 rad/s, BPN MRAS observer (experiment).

On the contrary, by adopting the MRAS OLS observer with the adaptive model employed in prediction mode with the modied Euler integration, no instability phenomena occur in eld weakening, as shown in the following experimental tests.

In these tests, the drive has been given a speed reference of 200 rad/s, then a speed reversal from 200 to 200 rad/s in the eld-weakening region, and, nally, a step reference of 0 rad/s at no load. Fig. 8 shows the estimated and measured speeds and

544

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 52, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

TABLE III DYNAMIC PERFORMANCE: OLS MRAS VERSUS BPN MRAS

the speed error while Fig. 9 shows the rotor ux linkage and the current during this test. They show that the speed reversal in the eld-weakening region is accomplished in 1 s, that the maximum instantaneous speed estimation error is 25 rad/s, and that the torque response is practically instantaneous. Moreover, these gures show that the MRAS OLS observer with modied Euler in prediction mode works correctly in eld weakening, without any instability phenomena, differently from the MRAS BPN observer, no matter whether the approximated adaptive or is adopted in simulation mode. model with 2) Experimental Test 2: Dynamic Performance: For comparison purposes, a set of speed reversals has been performed both with the OLS MRAS and with the BPN MRAS observer. In this respect, it should be remarked that, since in the BPN MRAS observer (as in [17]) the adaptive model is employed in simulation mode, the speed estimation convergence is slower than that obtained with the OLS MRAS observer in prediction mode. In addition, the estimated speed is highly affected by ripple and cannot be directly fed to the control system without any ltering. This is not the case for the OLS MRAS observer in which, thanks to the employment of the adaptive model as a predictor, the estimated speed is directly fed back to the control system without any ltering. Fig. 10 shows the speed transient obtained with the BPN MRAS observer when a step speed reference of 100 rad/s is given. It shows, in particular, the measured speed as well as the speed estimated by the BPN MRAS observer, respectively, before and after ltering. It can be clearly seen that the estimated speed before ltering is noisy and affected by high ripple while the estimated speed after ltering is clean and without ripple. This is paid off with the resulting time delay of the ltering, which brings about a reduction of the proportional and integral gains of the PI as shown below. In fact, the improvements in terms of dynamic performance achieved with the OLS MRAS observer have been veried by comparing the speed responses of both MRAS observers during three speed reversals, respectively, from 100 to 100 rad/s, from 50 to 50 rad/s, and from 10 to 10 rad/s. Fig. 11(a) and (b) shows the measured speed, the estimated speed, the speed estimation error, and the current component during the speed reversal from 100 to 100 rad/s obtained, respectively, with the OLS MRAS observer and the BPN MRAS observer. Fig. 12(a) and (b) shows the measured speed, the estimated speed, the speed estimation error, and the current component during the speed reversal from 50 to 50 rad/s obtained, respectively, with the OLS MRAS observer and the BPN MRAS observer. Fig. 13(a) and (b) shows the measured speed, the estimated speed, the speed estimation error, and the current component during the speed reversal from 10 to 10 rad/s obtained,

(a)

(b) Fig. 14. (a) Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a series of speed steps with rated load, OLS MRAS observer (experiment). (b) Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a series of speed steps with no load, OLS MRAS observer (experiment).

respectively, with the OLS MRAS observer and the BPN MRAS observer. All these gures reveal that the OLS MRAS observer permits a faster speed response: the time during which the speed reversal is performed is lower in all tests and this time reduction is in percentage more signicant during a reversal at low speed, e.g., 0.1490 s with the OLS MRAS against 0.1780 s with the BPN MRAS during the speed reversal from 10 to 10 rad/s. Moreover, in all tests the speed estimation error obtained with the OLS MRAS observer is lower than the corresponding one obtained with the BPN MRAS, even if the estimated speed is

CIRRINCIONE AND PUCCI: MRAS-BASED SENSORLESS HIGH-PERFORMANCE INDUCTION MOTOR

545

(a)

(b) Fig. 15. (a) Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a constant speed reference of 10 rad/s at no load and at rated load, OLS MRAS observer (experiment). (b) Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a constant speed reference of 10 rad/s at no load and at rated load, BPN MRAS observer (experiment).

ltered with the latter method. Finally, the torque response obtained with the OLS MRAS observer is very smooth, while the

corresponding one obtained with the BPN MRAS observer is much affected by ripple (see, in particular, Fig. 11).

546

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 52, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

(a)

(b) Fig. 16. (a) Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a constant speed reference of 8 rad/s at no load and at rated load, OLS MRAS observer (experiment). (b) Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a constant speed reference of 8 rad/s at no load and at rated load, BPN MRAS observer (experiment).

CIRRINCIONE AND PUCCI: MRAS-BASED SENSORLESS HIGH-PERFORMANCE INDUCTION MOTOR

547

(a)

(b) Fig. 17. (a) Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a constant speed reference of 5 rad/s at no load and at rated load, OLS MRAS observer (experiment). (b) Estimated and measured speed and speed error during a constant speed reference of 5 rad/s at no load and at rated load, BPN MRAS observer (experiment).

548

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 52, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

All the above results are summarized in Table III which displays, for both observers, the proportional and integral gains of the speed controller, the 3-dB bandwidth, the speed reversal times during the three above-mentioned tests, and the maximum percent overshoot during the most critical speed reversal (from 100 to 100 rad/s). It can be seen that, because of ltering, the proportional and integral gains of the speed controller with the OLS MRAS observer are almost 1.6 times as much as those obtained with the BPN MRAS. In the same way, the 3-dB bandwidth with the OLS MRAS observer is almost 16% higher than the corresponding one with the BPN MRAS. Finally, even if during speed transients the dynamic performance is better and the maximum instantaneous estimation error is lower, the maximum overshoot obtained with the OLS MRAS is lower than the corresponding one with the BPN MRAS, respectively, 9.5% against 16%, because of the absence of ltering of the estimated speed in the OLS MRAS observer. 3) Experimental Test 3: Medium/Low-Speed Accuracy: In the third test the accuracy of the speed estimation has been veried in the medium/low-speed ranges, by giving a set of steps of speed references ranging from 140 to 30 rad/s. This test has been performed twice, at rated load and at no load. Fig. 14(a) shows the estimated speed, the measured speed, and the speed error at rated load while Fig. 14(b) shows the same waveforms at no load, obtained with the OLS MRAS observer. These gures clearly show that the estimation accuracy in the medium/low-speed range is very good, with negligible estimation errors during steady state and very low instantaneous estimation errors during the speed transients. Similar results have been obtained with the BPN MRAS observer: they presented, as a difference, only a slightly higher instantaneous estimation error, as explained in Test 2. 4) Experimental Test 4: Low-Speed Accuracy: In the fourth test the accuracy of the speed estimation has been veried in the low-speed ranges, by giving a set of constant-speed references ranging from 10 to 5 rad/s. This test has been performed twice both with the OLS MRAS and the BPN MRAS observer, respectively, at no load and at rated load torque. Fig. 15(a) and (b) shows the measured speed , the estimated speed, and the speed estimation error obtained at the constant reference speed of 10 rad/s at no load and at rated load, respectively, with the OLS MRAS and the BPN MRAS observer. Figs. 16(a) and (b) and 17(a) and (b) show the same waveforms obtained at the constant reference speeds of 8 and 5 rad/s at no load and at rated load, respectively, with the OLS MRAS and with the BPN MRAS observer. These gures show that, with both speed observers, the estimation accuracy reduces with increasing load torques and that the steady-state percent speed estimation error obtained with the OLS MRAS observer is slightly lower than that with the BPN MRAS, especially at rated load: 6% against 13.4% at rated load with 10 rad/s reference, 6.72% against 18.5% at rated load with 8 rad/s reference, and, nally, 34.6% against 39% at rated load with 10 rad/s reference. Finally, Fig. 18 shows the variation of the steady-state percent estimation error against the percent load torque obtained with the OLS MRAS observer and it reveals an increase of the estimation error with load, as expected; in particular, the percent

Fig. 18. Percent speed estimation error versus percent rated load torque during a constant speed reference of 6 rad/s, OLS MRAS observer (experiment).

Fig. 19. Real and LP estimated rotor ux linkage d-axis component at a constant speed reference of 5 rad/s at no load, OLS MRAS observer (simulation).

speed error varies from almost 2% at 20% rated torque to 15% at rated load. Similar results have been obtained with the BPN MRAS observer, with slightly higher steady-state estimation errors at each load. It is noteworthy, however, that the accuracy in the very-lowspeed region is mainly limited by factors almost independent from the estimation algorithm, the main of which are the sensitivity of the reference model to the stator resistance variation due to heating/cooling [28], the sensitivity of the adaptive model to the rotor time constant variation due to heating/cooling or magnetic saturation [28], and the problems due to open-loop integration of the ux signal and to the inverter nonlinearity effects ([4][6]). It should also be remarked that at very low speeds in correspondence of the cutoff frequency of the LP lter, the LP integrator (employed here with both speed observers) does not work properly since its frequency response highly differs both

CIRRINCIONE AND PUCCI: MRAS-BASED SENSORLESS HIGH-PERFORMANCE INDUCTION MOTOR

549

Fig. 20.

Estimated and measured speed in zero-speed operation at no load, OLS and BPN MRAS observers (experiment).

in magnitude and in phase from that of an ideal integrator. Therefore, below the cutoff frequency of the LP integrator, the detuning of the ux models due to the not perfect integration is also to be considered. In this respect Fig. 19 shows the real rotor ux direct-axis component in the stator reference frame and the estimated one at the speed reference of 5 rad/s when an LP integrator is used and the parameters of the ux estimator are correctly tuned, as obtained by numerical simulations (in an experiment, the real ux would be unknown). It shows that, even if the ux model is correctly tuned, the incorrect integration brings about a wrong estimation of both the magnitude and the phase of the estimated ux: the amplitude of the real ux is 2.24 times as much as the estimated one and the angle error is about 64 . This requires proper modied integrators ([29][34]). In any case, better results in the estimation accuracy at low speeds are to be expected with both OLS MRAS and BPN MRAS observers, if proper integrators are used ([29][34]). These integrators, however, increase the overall complexity and computational burden of the control algorithm and, therefore, are to be recommended only if very-low-speed operation is required. In the latter case, because of the high sensitivity of the reference model (open-loop estimator) to the stator resistance variation at low speed, an online estimation algorithm of the stator resistance is necessary (see [4][6]). 5) Experimental Test 5: Zero-Speed Operation: In the fth test the drive has been operated at the rated rotor ux linkage at zero speed. The test has been performed at no load both with the OLS MRAS observer and with the BPN MRAS one.

Fig. 20 shows the waveforms of the reference, measured, and estimated speeds for a time interval of about 60 s obtained both with the OLS MRAS and BPN MRAS observers. With reference to the results of the OLS MRAS observer, it shows that, after the magnetization of the machine, the drive can work properly at zero speed and at no load, even without any signal injection: this is mainly due to the fact that the adaptive model is used in prediction mode and is, thus, more stable than when used in simulation mode, that is, with feedback loops of the estimated rotor ux linkage. In particular, the estimated speed has small oscillations around 0 rad/s while the measured speed is always zero, except for some spikes caused by the not perfect ltering of the speed signal coming from the incremental encoder: in any case the rotor does not move. With reference to the results of the BPN MRAS observer, this gure shows that the estimated speed hardly follows the measured one and its instantaneous speed estimation error is higher than that obtained with the OLS MRAS observer. Moreover, with the BPN MRAS observer the estimated speed does not correctly follow its reference of 0 rad/s with a resulting worse behavior of the drive, which rotates around zero speed, even reaching a speed of 15 rad/s during transients. VII. CONCLUSION This paper has presented a new MRAS speed observer for high-performance FOC induction motor drives based on adaptive neural networks. It is an evolution and an improvement of

550

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 52, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

the MRAS observer shown in [17]. In particular, the new MRAS speed observer uses the current model as an adaptive model discretized with the modied Euler integration method. Then, a linear neural network is obtained and trained online by means of an OLS algorithm, and not a nonlinear BPN algorithm, which is heavier from the computation point of view and can cause some drawbacks because of its inherent nonlinearity. Moreover, the neural adaptive model is employed here in prediction mode, and not in simulation mode as in [17]. The use of the prediction mode ensures better accuracy and stability than the simulation mode. In detail, the proposed OLS MRAS observer outperforms the one presented in [17] in the following aspects, as proven theoretically, in numerical simulation, and experimentally: quicker convergence in speed estimation; absence of ltering in the estimated speed; higher bandwidth of the speed loop, that is, better dynamic performances; lower estimation errors both in transient and steady-state operation; better behavior in zero-speed operation at no load; lower complexity and computational burden of the adaptive model; stable behavior in eld weakening. REFERENCES
[1] C. Shauder, Adaptive speed identication for vector control of induction motors without rotational transducers, IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol. 28, no. 5, pp. 10541061, Sep./Oct. 1992. [2] H. Tajima and Y. Hori, Speed sensorless eld-orientation of the induction machine, IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol. 29, no. 1, pp. 175180, Jan./Feb. 1993. [3] F. Peng and T. Fukao, Robust speed identication for speed-sensorless vector control of induction motors, IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol. 30, no. 5, pp. 12341240, Sep./Oct. 1994. [4] J. Holtz, Sensorless control of induction motor drives, Proc. IEEE, vol. 90, no. 8, pp. 13591394, Aug. 2002. [5] J. Holtz and Q. Juntao, Sensorless vector control of induction motors at very low speed using a nonlinear inverter model and parameter identication, IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol. 38, no. 4, pp. 10871095, Jul./Aug. 2002. [6] , Drift- and parameter-compensated ux estimator for persistent zero-stator-frequency operation of sensorless-controlled induction motors, IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol. 39, no. 4, pp. 10521060, Jul./Aug. 2003. [7] K. Rajashekara, A. Kawamura, and K. Matsuse, Sensorless Control of AC Motor Drives. New York: IEEE Press, 1996. [8] P. Vas, Sensorless Vector and Direct Torque Control. Oxford, U.K.: Oxford Science, 1998. [9] C. Lascu, I. Boldea, and F. Blaabjerg, A modied direct torque control for induction motor sensorless drive, IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol. 36, no. 1, pp. 122130, Jan./Feb. 2000. [10] C. Lascu and A. M.. Trynadlowski, A sensorless hybrid DTC drive for high-volume applications using the TMS320F243 DSP controller, in Conf. Rec. IEEE-IAS Annu. Meeting, vol. 1, 2001, pp. 482489. [11] , Combining the principles of sliding mode, direct torque control, and space vector modulation in high-performance sensorless AC drive, in Conf. Rec. IEEE-IAS Annu. Meeting, vol. 3, 2002, pp. 20732079. [12] H. Kubota, K. Matsuse, and T. Nakano, DSP-based speed adaptive Flux observer of induction motor, IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol. 29, no. 2, pp. 344348, Mar./Apr. 1993. [13] H. Kubota, I. Sato, Y. Tamura, K. Matsuse, H. Ohta, and Y. Hori, Stable operation of adaptive observer based sensorless induction motor drives in regenerating mode at low speeds, in Conf. Rec. IEEE-IAS Annu. Meeting, vol. 1, Oct. 2001, pp. 469474.

[14] H. Kubota, K. Matsuse, and Y. Hori, Behavior of sensorless induction motor drives in regenerating mode, in Proc. PCC97, vol. 2, Nagaoka, Japan, 1997, pp. 549552. [15] L. Ben-Brahim and R. Kurosawa, Identication of induction motor speed using neural networks, in Proc. PCC93, Yokohama, Japan, 1993, pp. 689694. [16] M. Elloumi, L. Ben-Brahim, and M. Al-Hamadi, Survey of speed sensorless controls for IM drives, in Proc. IEEE IECON98, vol. 2, 1998, pp. 10181023. [17] L. Ben-Brahim, S. Tadakuma, and A. Akdag, Speed control of induction motor without rotational transducers, IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol. 35, no. 4, pp. 844850, Jul./Aug. 1999. [18] P. Vas, A. F. Stronach, M. Rashed, and M. Neuroth, Implementation of ANN-based sensorless induction motor drives, in Proc. 9th Int. Conf. Electrical Machines and Drives, 1999, pp. 329333. [19] M. P. Kazmierkowski, D. L. Sobczuk, and P. Z. Filipek, Sensorless control of induction motor using a neural network for speed estimation, in Proc. IEEE ISIE97, vol. 3, Guimaraes, Portugal, 1997, pp. 12421246. [20] T. Chen and T. Sheu, Model reference neural network controller for induction motor speed control, IEEE Trans. Energy Convers., vol. 17, no. 2, pp. 157163, Jun. 2002. [21] S. Kim, T. Park, J. Yoo, and G. Park, Speed-sensorless vector control of an induction motor using neural network speed estimation, IEEE Trans. Ind. Electron., vol. 48, no. 3, pp. 609614, Jun. 2001. [22] X. Ma and Z. Na, Neural network identication scheme for speed sensor-less DTC induction motor drive system, in Proc. PIEMC, vol. 3, 2000, pp. 12421245. [23] R. Blasco-Gimenez, G. M. Asher, M. Sumner, and K. J. Bradley, Dynamic performance limitations for MRAS based sensorless induction motor drives. I. Stability analysis for the closed loop drive, Proc. IEEElect. Power Appl., vol. 143, no. 2, pp. 113122, 1996. [24] P. L. Jansen and R. D. Lorenz, Accuracy limitations of velocity and ux estimation in direct eld oriented induction machines, in Proc. EPE93, 1993, pp. 312318. [25] O. Sorensen, Neural network in control application, Ph.D. dissertation, Dept. Control Eng., Aalborg Univ., Aalborg East, Denmark, 1994. [26] J. H. Matheus and K. D. Fink, Numerical Methods Using Matlab, 4th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 2004. [27] M. Cirrincione and M. Pucci, Experimental verication of a technique for the real-time identication of induction motors based on the recursive least-squares, in Proc. IEEE AMC02, Maribor, Slovenia, Jul. 35, 2002, pp. 326334. [28] P. L. Jansen and R. D. Lorenz, A physically insightful approach to the design and accuracy assessment of ux observers for eld oriented induction machine drives, IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol. 30, no. 1, pp. 101110, Jan./Feb. 1994. [29] M. Cirrincione, M. Pucci, G. Cirrincione, and G. A. Capolino, A new adaptive integration methodology for estimating ux in induction machine drives, IEEE Trans. Power Electron., vol. 19, no. 1, pp. 2534, Jan. 2004. [30] J. Hu and B. Wu, New integration algorithms for estimating motor ux over a wide speed range, IEEE Trans. Power Electron., vol. 13, no. 5, pp. 969977, Sep. 1998. [31] L. E. Borges de Silva, B. K. Bose, and J. O. P. Pinto, Recurrent-neuralnetwork-based implementation of a programmable cascaded low-pass lter used in stator ux synthesis of vector-controlled induction motor drive, IEEE Trans. Ind. Electron., vol. 46, no. 3, pp. 662665, Jun. 1999. [32] J. O. P. Pinto, B. K. Bose, and L. E. Borges de Silva, A stator-ux-oriented vector-controlled induction motor drive with space-vector PWM and ux-vector synthesis by neural network, IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol. 37, no. 5, pp. 13081318, Sep./Oct. 2001. [33] B. K. Bose and N. R. Patel, A sensorless stator ux oriented vector controlled induction motor drive with neuro-fuzzy based performance enhancement, in Proc. IEEE-IAS Annu. Meeting, vol. 1, Oct. 59, 1997, pp. 393400. [34] K. D. Hurst, T. Hableter, G. Griva, and F. Profumo, Zero-speed tacholess IM torque control: Simply a matter of stator voltage integration, IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol. 34, no. 4, pp. 790795, Jul./Aug. 1998. [35] M. Cirrincione, M. Pucci, G. Cirrincione, and G. A. Capolino, A new experimental application of least-squares techniques for the estimation of the induction motor parameters, IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol. 39, no. 5, pp. 12471256, Sep./Oct. 2003.

CIRRINCIONE AND PUCCI: MRAS-BASED SENSORLESS HIGH-PERFORMANCE INDUCTION MOTOR

551

Maurizio Cirrincione (M03) received the Laurea degree from the Politecnico di Turino, Turin, Italy, in 1991, and the Ph.D. degree from the University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy, in 1996, both in electrical engineering. Since 1996, he has been a Researcher with the Section of Palermo, Istituto di Studi sui Sistemi Intelligenti per lAutomazione (I.S.S.I.A.-C.N.R.), Palermo, Italy. His current research interests are neural networks for modeling and control, system identication, intelligent control, electrical machines, and drives. Dr. Cirrincione was awarded the E. R. Caianiello Prize for the best Italian Ph.D. dissertation on neural networks in 1997.

Marcello Pucci (M03) received the Laurea and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy, in 1997 and 2002, respectively. In 2000, he was a Host Student at the Institute of Automatic Control, Technical University of Braunschweig, Braunschweig, Germany, working in the eld of control of ac machines, with a grant from the Deutscher Akademischer Austauscdienst-German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD). Since 2001, he has been a Researcher with the Section of Palermo, Istituto di Studi sui Sistemi Intelligenti per lAutomazione (I.S.S.I.A.-C.N.R.), Palermo, Italy. His current research interests are electrical machines, control, diagnosis and identication techniques of electrical drives, intelligent control, and power converters. Dr. Pucci is a Member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Electrical Systems.