Research J ournal of Applied Sciences, Engineering and Technology 4(16): 2783-2788, 2012

ISSN: 2040-7467
Maxwell Scientific Organization, 2012
Submitted: March 26, 2012 Accepted: April 17, 2012 Published: August 15, 2012
Corresponding Author: Xianqing Cao, Shenyang University of Chemical Technology, Shenyang 110142, China
2783
Dynamic Dead-time Effect Compensation Scheme for Pmsm Drive
Xianqing Cao and Liping Fan
Shenyang University of Chemical Technology, Shenyang 110142, China
Abstract: To improve the performance of the permanent magnet synchronous motor drive system effectively,
this study presents a novel dynamic dead-time compensation scheme, which is based on the device
characteristics and the running conditions of the motor. Finally, the results of experiment verify its validity.
Keywords: Dead-time effect, dynamic compensation, the trailing effect
INTRODUCTION
Due to its excellent properties, permanent magnet
synchronous motor is used widely in the fuel cell electric
vehicle. One of the key technology for the electric vehicle
industry is reducing the interference to other vehicle
electrical appliance, which can be realized by the
harmonic suppression for the permanent magnet
synchronous motor drive system. In general, there exists
voltage distortion between the reference and the actual
output voltage in a pulse-width-modulated voltage-source
inverter. This distortion is dead-time effect which caused
by the dead-time setting and non-ideal switching
characteristics of power devices (Wang et al., 2008;
Hyun-Soo et al., 2003; Kim et al., 2004).
To compensate the dead-time effects, several
approaches are presented. All the methods can be
classified into two categories: the PWM gate signals
modification and the feed forward method. Choi and Sul
(1996) and Munoz and Lipo (1999) present a
implementation to modify the PWM gate signals using
hardware circuits such as the current polarity detection
and logic combination circuit. But it is difficult to sense
the switching delay, transition time and on-drop of power
devices. In Wu et al. (2005), fixed error voltage vectors
generated by dead-time, switching devices turn-on and
turn-off time are introduced. Actually, the running
condition of the motor affects the compensating voltages.
Hyun-Soo et al. (2003) and Kim et al. (2004) present an
online disturbance observer, in this method, the
compensating voltages are calculated using the dead time,
switching period, current command and dc link voltage.
However, it ignores the parameter variations of the motor.
In order to improve the compensation effect, a
dynamic compensation method is proposed in this study,
which is based on the characteristics of the power devices
and the actual motor running state. The results of
experiment are given to verify its validity at the end of
this study.
Fig. 1: One leg of three phase inverter
METHODOLOGY
Analysis of dead-time effects: One leg of the three-phase
inverter which employs the space vector PWM technique
is shown in Fig. 1. Under ideal conditions, the state of the
two power switches is complementary. But in practical
application, the switch signals outputted by the controller
(DSP) are delivered to power switches of the main circuit
by the driving circuit which contains optical couplers.
Considering the switch delay and tailing effect (the turn-
off time is greater than the opening time) of optical
couplers and power switches, the switch signals of the
same bridge leg are shown as Fig. 2.
To prevent the simultaneous conduction of two
switching devices in each leg of the inverter, it is
necessary to set dead time t
dead
. In fact, the actual dead-
time T
dead
should also includes turn-on time and turn-off
time of the optical couple and the power switch, which is
shown as
T
dead
=t
dead
+(t
1
+t
2
)-(t
3
+t
4
) (1)
where, t
1
is the turn-on time of optical coupler; t
2
is the
turn-on time of power switch; t
3
is the turn-off time of
optical coupler; t
4
is the turn-off time of power switch.
Res. J. Appl. Sci. Eng. Technol., 4(16): 2783-2788, 2012
2784
Fig. 2: Ideal and practical switching pattern
Table 1: Relationship between u
a0
and i
a
S
a
=1 S
a
=0
i
a
$0 u
a0
=U
dc
/2-U
ce
u
a0
=-U
dc
/2-U
d
i
a
<0 u
a0
=U
dc
/2+U
d
u
a0
=-U
dc
/2+U
ce

In addition, the direction of current i
a
will also affect
the voltage applied to the motor. Considering the direction
of current i
a
and the conduction voltage drop of the power
switch and anti-parallel diode, the terminal u
a0
is given in
Table 1.
As can be seen from Table 1, the general voltage can
be represented as Kim et al. (2004):
u
a0
=(U
dc
-U
ce
+U
d
)(S
a
-0.5)-0.5(U
ce
+U
d
)sgn(i
a
) (2)
where, U
dc
represents the DC bus voltage, U
ce
and U
d
represents the saturation voltage of the power switch and
the anti-parallel diode respectively, sgn(.) is a sign
function. Thus, the voltage during the n
th
PWM step can
be derived from (2) and shown as (Kim et al., 2004):
(3)
u n U U U
T n
T
U U i
a dc ce d
a
s
ce d a
0
05
05
( ) ( )
( )
.
. ( )sgn( )
= +

+
where, T
s
is the sampling period. T*
a
(n)=T*
a
(n)
gn(i
a
)T
dead
, T*
a
(n) is the on-time reference value of the
upper power switch of phase a at the n
th
PWM period.
According to the theory of electrical engineering, the
relationship between the phase voltage and the neural
voltage can be expressed as follows (Kim et al., 2004):
(4)
( )( )
u n
u u u
U U Ud T n T n T n
T
i i i U U
no
ao bo co
dc ce a b c
s
a b c ce d
( )
( ) ( ) ( )
.
sgn( ) sgn( ) sgn( )
=
+ +
=
+

+ +

+ + +
3
3
15
6
From (3) and (4), it can be derived as:
(5)
u n
U U U T n T n T n
T
i i i U U
an
dc ce d a b c
s
a b c ce d
( )
( ) ( ) ( )
( sgn( ) sgn( ) sgn( ))( )
=
+

+
3
2
2
6
From the above analysis, phase a voltage distortion
caused by the dead-time effect can be represented as:
Res. J. Appl. Sci. Eng. Technol., 4(16): 2783-2788, 2012
2785
0
1
2
3
4
5
0 80 160 240 320
i /A
C
u





/

V
C
E

T =25 C
T =125 C
j
j
o
o
10
10
10 10 10
i /A
C
t



t




/

a
n
d


s

T =25 C
T =125 C
j
j
o
o
V =600V
CC
t
t
off
on
1 2 3
10
1
0
-1
o
n
o
f
f
(6)
u n u n uan n
I U
T n T n T n
T
Sgn A
U U
Sgn A
u U Ud T
T
an an
ce d
a b c
s
ce d
dc ce daed
s
( ) * ( ) ( )
( )
* ( ) * ( ) * ( )
( )
( )
= =

+
+
+
+

3
2
6
3
where, Sgn(A) =(2sgn(i
a
)!sgn(i
b
)!sgn(i
c
)).
Considering the actual selection of the power switch
and anti-parallel diode (U
ce
and U
d
is 2.3 and 2.5 V,
respectively), the maximum value of the first part
, it can max
( ) * ( ) * ( ) * ( ) .
.
U U T n T n T n
T
V
ce d a b c
s

=
3
2 02
3
2 013
be ignored relative to the remaining parts. Thus (6) can be
simplified as:
(7)
u n u n u n Sgn A
U U
Sgn A
U U U T
Ts
an an an
ce d
dc ce d dead
( ) * ( ) ( ) ( )
( )
= =
+
+
+

6
3
Similarly, voltage distortion of phase b and phase c
can be expressed as follows:
(8)
u n Sgn B
U U
Sgn B
U U Ud T
T
bn
ce d
dc ce dead
s
( ) ( )
( )
=
+
+
+

6
3
(9)
u n Sgn C
U U
Sgn C
U U U T
T
cn
ce d
dc ce d dead
s
( ) ( )
( )
=
+
+
+

6
3
where, Sgn(B) =(2sgn(i
b
)-sgn(i
a
)-sgn(i
c
)) sgn.(i
c
) =(2sgn
(i
c
)(-sgn (i
a
)-sgn (i
b
)):
Fig. 3: The relation curve between U
ce
and i
c
Fig. 4: The relation curve between switch time and i
c
Table 2: Relationship between sign function and the sector
Sector Sgn(i
a
) Sgn(i
b
) Sgn(i
c
) Sgn(A) Sgn(B) Sgn(c)
1 0 - - 4 -2 -2
2 0 + - 2 2 -4
3 - + - -2 4 -2
4 - + + -4 2 2
5 - - + -2 -2 4
6 + - + 2 -4 2
Algorithm of dead time effect dynamic compensation:
Determination of U
ce
: The dead time dynamic
compensation scheme proposed in this study is valid
when the entire system works in steady state, that is, the
temperature rising is constant.
The power switch selected in this study is Intelligent
Power Module (IPM) PM200DSA120, its stable junction
temperature is 125 according to the product manual.
When the temperature keeping constant, the saturation
voltage of the power switch U
ce
will change with the
conduction current i
c
. The relation curve of U
ce
and i
c
is
given in Fig. 3, using the partition linearization means, U
ce
can calculated by (10):
(10)
U i A i A
U i A i A
ce c c
ce c c
= + < <
= +

05 025 0 20
1 0006 20 280
. .
.
Determination of T
dead
: In this study, the optical couplers
for driving circuit are 6n137, its turn-on and turn-off time
are almost unchanged at constant ambient temperatures,
so t
1
and t
3
can be chosen as its typical values 0.05 :s and
0.13:s respectively. If the power switches of the main
circuit are IGBT, the turn-on and turn-off time of the
driving chip will be bigger.
The value of the turn-on time and turn-on time of
power switch is also related with the conduction current
i
c
.The relation curve is shown in Fig. 4, their value can be
derived by (11):
(11)
t t i
t t i
on c
off c
= = +
= =

2
4
16 0001
25 00006
. .
. .
Res. J. Appl. Sci. Eng. Technol., 4(16): 2783-2788, 2012
2786
0
.
0
2
0
0
0
.
0
2
0
2
0
.
0
2
0
4
0
.
0
2
0
6
0
.
0
2
0
8
0
.
0
2
0
8
0
20
10
u
d d
e
a
d
,
u
q d
e
a
d


/
V
u
d
dead u
q
dead
t/s
0
.
0
5
-20
20
0
t/s
0
.
1
5
0
.
1
0
i
i

i






,



,

/
A
A
B
C
Fig. 5: Block diagram of PMSM drive based on the proposed dynamic dead-time effects compensation
Table 3: Relationship between sign function and the sector
Rated power P
N
(kW) 55.000
Rated voltage U
N
(V) 440.000
Magnetic pole pairs p 3.000
Rated speed (r/min) 1800.000
Rated current (A) 90.000
Stator resistance R
s
(S) 0.061
d-axis stator inductanceL
d
(mH) 2.530
q-axis stator inductanceL
q
(mH) 3.290
Rotor flux linkage Q
f
(Wb) 0.650
Because they all have little changes during the whole
operating range, for simplicity, t
2
and t
4
can be chosen as
1.7 and 2.45, respectively in the practical application.
Determination of Sgn (.): Sgn(.) depends on the current
direction. According to SVPWM theory, the current
direction determined by the sector of the current vector.
The relationship between Sgn(.)and the sector is given in
Table 2.
Determination of voltage distortion: The voltage
distortion in two-phase stationary frame can be derived
from (7), (8) and (9), shown as follows:
(12)

u
u
u
u
u
s
s
an
bn
cn

2
3
1
1
2
1
2
0
3
2
3
2
Once )u
sa
and )u
s$
is determined, the suitable
voltage vector can be calculated by the SVPWM
algorithm.

RESULTS OF SIMULATION AND
EXPERIMENT
A block diagram of the PMSM drive based on
dynamic dead-time compensation is shown in Fig. 5. The
parameters of PMSM used in this study are shown in
Table 3.
a) q- and d-axis voltage distortion
b) dead-time effects
Fig. 6: Current difference caused by dead-time effects
Because the dead-time effects phenomena are
obvious when the motor runs at low speed and light load,
therefore, the effectiveness of the proposed approach is
verified only in this case.
Simulation results: Results of simulation are shown in
Fig. 6 in the condition: T
Z
=30 N.m, n* =200 r/min, It
can be seen: In the steady state, the q-and d-axis error
Res. J. Appl. Sci. Eng. Technol., 4(16): 2783-2788, 2012
2787
50ms
i


/
2
0
A
A
0%
2.26%
1.13%
3.39%
4.52%
5.65%
6.78%
7.91%
9.04%
10.17%
10.30%
2 8 5 17 11 14 20 23 26 29
Harmonic order



H
a
r
m
o
n
i
c

m
a
g
n
i
t
u
d
e


/
f
u
n
d
a
m
e
n
t
a
l

a
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

0%
3.6%
1.8%
5.4%
7.2%
9.0%
10.8%
12.6%
14.4%
16.2%
18.0%
2 8 5 17 11 14 20 23 26 29
Harmonic order



H
a
r
m
o
n
i
c

m
a
g
n
i
t
u
d
e


/
f
u
n
d
a
m
e
n
t
a
l

a
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

50ms
i


/
2
0
A
A
50ms
i


/
2
0
A
A
0%
1.34%
0.67%
2.01%
2.68%
3.35%
4.02%
4.69%
5.36%
6.03%
6.70%
2 8 5 17 11 14 20 23 26 29
Harmonic order



H
a
r
m
o
n
i
c

m
a
g
n
i
t
u
d
e


/
f
u
n
d
a
m
e
n
t
a
l

a
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

Fig. 7: A-phase current and harmonious analysis without compensation at case 1
Fig. 8: A-phase current wave and harmonious analysis of the proposed compensation scheme at case 1
Fig. 9: A-phase current and harmonious analysis without compensation at case 2
voltage caused by dead-time effects are periodic
functions, whose cycle is same as the cycle of the PWM;
there exists zero clamp, at the same time, the shoulder of
the current wave will became flat. These phenomena will
have adverse effects on the motor system, therefore, it is
necessary for dead-time compensation.
Experimental results:
The experimental conditions are considered here:
Case 1: Tz =30 n.m,n* =200 r/min
Case 2: T
z
=70 N, n* =200 r/min
The current response wave and harmonious analysis
at case 1 case 2 are given in Fig. 7, 8, 9 and 10. At case 1,
the THD of the current of phase a is 21.25% when
without compensation, and it reduced to 12.83% with the
proposed compensation method.
At case 2, the THD of the current is 11.52% when
without compensation, and it reduced to 7.81% with the
proposed compensation method.
From these Figures, we can see that the proposed
scheme can improve the response performance and give
an ideal current wave at different load torque and different
reference speed. It is especially apparent at the low speed
and light load.
Res. J. Appl. Sci. Eng. Technol., 4(16): 2783-2788, 2012
2788
50ms
i


/
2
0
A
A
0%
1.34%
0.67%
2.01%
2.68%
3.35%
4.02%
4.69%
5.36%
6.03%
6.70%
2 8 5 17 11 14 20 23 26 29
Harmonic order



H
a
r
m
o
n
i
c

m
a
g
n
i
t
u
d
e


/
f
u
n
d
a
m
e
n
t
a
l

a
m
p
l
i
t
u
d
e

Fig. 10: A-phase current wave and harmonious analysis of the proposed compensation scheme at case 2
CONCLUSION
A practical dead-time effects compensation method
for PMSM drive based on the device characteristics and
the running conditions of the motor is proposed. Results
of experiments are provided to demonstrate the
effectiveness of the proposed method at different load
torque and different reference speed, at the low speed and
light load, the compensation effect is especially apparent.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This study is supported by the national science
foundation of china (No. 61143007) and Scientific
Research Project of Liaoning province education
department (No. L2010443).
REFERENCES
Choi, J .W. and S.K. Sul, 1996. Inverter output voltage
synthesis using novel dead time compensation. IEEE
T. Pow. Electr., 11(2): 221-227.
Hyun-Soo, K., M. Hyung-Tae and Y. Myung-J oong,
2003. On-line dead-time compensation method using
disturbance observer. IEEE T. Pow. Electr.,
18(6): 1336-1345.
Kim, H.W., H.S. Kim and M.J . Youn, 2004. Online
observation and compensation of voltage distortion
in PWM VSI for PMSM. IEEE Proc. Electr. Pow.,
151(5): 534-542.
Munoz, A.R. and T.A. Lipo, 1999. On-line dead-time
compensation technique for open-loop PWM-VSI
drives. IEEE Trans. Pow. Electr (APEC)., 1:95-100.
Wang, G., Y. Yu and R. Yang, 2008. Dead-time
compensation of space vector PWM inverter for
induction motor. Proc. CSEE, 28(15): 79-83.
Wu, M., R. Zhao and X. Tang, 2005. Study of vector-
controlled permanent magnet synchronous motor at
low speed and light load. Trans. China Electrotechn.
Soc., pp: 87-92.