Drive Control

Intro:
From the viewpoint of electric and control engineering, EVs are advantageous over
traditional vehicles with internal combustion engine. The remarkable merit of EVs is
the electric motors excellent performance in motion control, which can be summarized
as:
(1) torque generation is very quick and accurate, hence electric motors can be
controlled much more quickly and precisely;
(2) output torque is easily comprehensible;
(3) motor can be small enough to be attached to each wheel;
(4) and the controller can be easily designed and implemented with comparatively
low cost.
Controller is the heart of an electric vehicle, and it is the key for the realization of a high-
performance electric vehicle with an optimal balance of maximum speed, acceleration
performance, and traveling range per charge.

Control of Electric Vehicle (EV), that too a F1 car, is not a simple task in that operation
of an EV is essentially time-variant (e.g., the operation parameters of EV and the road
condition are always varying). Therefore, the controller should be designed to make the
system robust and adaptive, improving the system on both dynamic and steady state
performances. Another factor making the control of EV unique is that EVs are really
"energy-management" machines. Currently, the major limiting factor for wide-spread
use of EVs is the short running distance per battery charge. Hence, besides controlling
the performance of vehicle, significant efforts have to be paid to the energy management
of the batteries on the formula car to finish a whole race.
Hence, in recent years, there is quite a lot of researches in the exploring advanced
control strategies in electric vehicles. As the development of the high computing
capability microprocessor, such as DSP (Digital Signal Processor), it is possible to
perform complex control on the electric vehicle to achieve optimal performance.
However, it is essential to establish a model-based control for the EV system, and
systematically study the characteristics to achieve optimal and robust control, therefore,
students are advised to have a brief knowledge of other departments before proceeding.

DRIVE CONTROL
Need:
The Drive Control system must enable a driver to be competitive on the racetrack in
both speed and efficiency. It must also meet all requirements of the Formula SAE
Electric rules and regulations.

Objective:
Our objective is to create a drive control system that can compete strongly against those
from the competing teams. The drive control system should convert inputs from the
driver into outputs for motors and the battery system to enable the driver to race
quickly, easily, comfortably, and safely.

Rules For Competition:
Two important rules for drive control are listed below:
1) Two potentiometers are required for the throttle pedal in order to create a
redundancy. For the drive system to function properly the position measurement
from each potentiometer must be within 10% of each other. If the measurement
differs more than 10% between the two potentiometers the controller then shuts
the motors down.
2) The controllers will be configured for regenerative braking to occur for the range
that begins when the car starts to slow down, and ends when the speed is 5kph.

Basic Design:

The above block diagram shows basic control unit functions. This is particularly for
vehicle with two motors namely left and right.
As shown above in this diagram, its components are one by one as follows :



INPUTS: 72 V DC Battery Power
Brake Sensor () analog
Throttle Sensor () analog
Steering Sensor () analog
Wheel Sensor (10-30v) digital
Outputs: Left Motor Power
Right Motor Power
Functionality: Utilize input from brake, throttle, steering and wheel sensors to
properly adjust the speed of each motor by delivering the proper amount of power
required.

Advanced circuit diagram:

This is circuit diagram involving the inputs, outputs and the voltage signals to all of
them.


Inputs: (Actual sensors used)
1) Brake Sensor - Potentiometer
2) Throttle sensors - Two potentiometers (For the rule 1 stated above)
3) Steering sensor - potentiometer
4) Wheel sensor- Inductive sensors
5) Input signals from BMS ( Battery Management System)
(Please search working of potentiometers and inductive sensors on internet- easily
available)
All the inputs are fed to main micro controller which is actually like brain of the drive
control unit. This controller processes the inputs.

Outputs:
The output signals are generated by micro controller which are further fed to motor
controller. These motor controller acts like nerves which transmit signals from brain to
our body parts. (In case of this vehicle the body part is torque generating motors.)
The signal is analog type in the form of voltage ranging from 0 to 5 volts, where 0
stands for no torque and 5 stands for maximum torque.
So based on inputs the micro controller (the brain) processes the data and gives signals
to motor controller (the nerves) which tell motors how much torque is to be generated.
The torque generated in left and right motor can differ from one another.
The basic principles of control unit are dealt now.
An EV controller may preferably have following functions:
Due to the frequent acceleration/deceleration and up/down of EV, it is preferably
that the regenerative control function is included, to save energy in battery and
hence enhance the driving range per charge;
Self diagnostics and restoration from failure;
Scalable to function expansion;
And comprehensive protection functions, including over-temperature
protection, over- voltage and under-voltage protection, over-current protection,
short-circuit protection, motor-lock protection, and protection for control unit,
main switch and security, etc.
Figure below shows detailed implementation of an EV controller with DSP (digital
signal processor). The whole system is composed of power circuit and control circuit.
The control board is usually provided with the motor, so we have to work on the
programming and connections of a DSP.


Note that the figure is just for one motor, the controller can be programmed for both the
motors similarly. Do not get confused with the components of a DSP (ADC, Flash, etc.),
because we get a DSP and work only on its programming and connections