DC MOTOR SPEED CONTROL

﷽
BAYAN UNIVERSITY FOR SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

ELECTRONIC SYSTEM ENGINEERING

3rd Year

DC MOTOR SPEED CONTROL

3/11/2020

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INTRODUCTION:

DC motors play a significant role in modern industrial

drives. They are extensively employed as variable speed
drives in rolling mills, cranes, hoists, elevators, machine
tools, and transit systems, etc.
Speed control methods of this class of motors are
simple and easy to adopt. The speeds are easily varied
above and below the rated speed by means of their field
currents and armature voltages. Both series and shunt
(with separate excitation) motors are employed as
variable speed drives. Initial torque is quite high especially
in dc series motors.
Therefore, a series motor is the traditional choice for
traction applications. However, due to commutation
problems, a dc motor cannot be used in applications that
require very high speeds. It also needs higher amount of
maintenance.
The choice of a power electronic converter circuit for
speed control depends on the available power supply. If
the power source is ac, either phase controlled ac to dc
converter and/or a dc chopper can be employed to
control both separately excited and series motors. But
with only dc supply available, choppers become a better
choice especially for dc series motor speed control.

Merits of thyristorized dc drives

Generally, thyristor controlled dc drives possess the following
advantages:
1. Simple and reliable operation.

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2. Very high efficiency, as high as 95%.

3. Fast and dynamic response.
4. Small size, less weight, and reduced space requirements.

Demerits of thyristorized dc drives

The disadvantages of the thyristorized dc drives can
be enumerated as follows:
1) Higher ripple content in the armature current. This
leads to increased motor heating and commutation
problems.
2) Speed regulation becomes poor when the armature
current becomes discontinuous especially at light
loads/high speeds.
3) Under certain operating conditions, input power
factor becomes poor.
4) Due to switching action of the thyristor devices and
non-sinusoidal nature of the input current, there is
an increased possibility of interference with the
adjacent communication networks.

DC motors have only two terminals. If you apply a voltage to

these terminals the motor will run, if you invert the terminals
position the motor will change its direction. If the motor is
running and you suddenly disconnect both terminals the
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motor will keep rotating but slowing down until stopping.

Finally if the motor is running and you suddenly short-circuit
both terminals the motor will stop.

Principle of Speed Control

The basic dc machine equations can be listed as follows:

The terminal voltage

V = E + Ia (Ra + Rext)
The back emf

E = K1NØ
Torque

T = K2IɑØ
Field flux

Ø= K3 I ƒ (neglecting saturation)

Where:
 Ia and If are armature and field currents respectively
 Ra and Rext are the armature and external resistances
added to the armature respective.
 N is the motor speed, and K1, K2 and K3 are constant.

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V
/ 1 3
K1K3If
It is clear that the speed N can be varied by:
A. Changing the armature voltage V while the field current If
is constant. This is referred to as armature voltage
control.
B. The variation of external resistance Rext.
C. The variation of If , while V is kept constant. This is
referred to as field current control.

Amongst the three methods, the first method, namely

the armature voltage control is used to obtain speeds
below the rated speed. This method is known for high
efficiency, fast response, and good speed regulation. On
the other hand, field current control is used to obtain
speeds above rated value.

These represents the theoretical ‘no load speed’ and a

drop in speed represented by the second term is due to
applied torque, T. The ‘no load speed’ can be varied by
means of the input voltage to the motor armature.
This is accomplished by means of firing angle of the converter
supply to the motor. The torque–speed characteristics of the
armature controlled dc motor are shown:

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CHOPPER CONTROLLED DC DRIVES

Choppers are preferred for the control of dc drives in electric
vehicles and traction. A chopper directly converts a fixed

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voltage dc supply into variable voltage dc supply. Therefore, a

variable dc voltage can be obtained by using a chopper to
control the speed of the motor. It is possible to operate the
motor in all the four quadrants by using suitable chopper
circuits. In this section, the efficacy of the chopper control is
brought out using a separately excited dc motor, controlled by
the chopper.

Here, three possible modes of operation are

considered, namely:
1) Motoring mode.
2) Regenerative braking mode.
3) Rheostatic or dynamic braking mode.
Motoring
A transistor chopper controlled separately excited motor drive
is shown in

This is one-quadrant drive, as the armature voltage and

current polarity cannot be changed. Waveform of motor

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terminal voltage Va and the armature current Ia . When the

transistor chopper is ON for a period Ton, the motor current
increases from ia1 to ia2. Since, during this period, the motor is
connected to the supply, the equation governing the armature
current is:

Here, V is the voltage applied to the motor. The current

increases from ia1 to ia2 during this period. When the chopper
is OFF, the armature current freewheels through the free-
wheeling diode and motor terminal voltage is zero. The
equation governing this free-wheeling mode is given by:

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Braking
Chopper circuits for regenerative braking and dynamic
braking operations respectively along with associated
voltage and current waveform
Controlling the ON time of the transistor Tr, it is possible to
transfer the converted electrical energy from the motor to the
supply. In the dynamic braking circuit, the effective value of the
braking resistor RB can be changed sleeplessly from 0 to RB as
is controlled from 1 to 0. In this method of braking, the
electrical energy converted from the motor is dissipated in
armature resistance, control transistor Tr, and braking resistor

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The speed–torque curves of chopper controlled separately

excited motor for both motoring and regenerative braking
operation:

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Chopper control can be applied to series motors also. In this

case, the motor speed can be varied by varying the duty ratio
alpha. Higher speeds can be obtained by increasing the duty
ratio which means the armature applied voltage is increased
when alpha is increased. Motoring characteristics of a chopper
controlled series motor are shown for different values of alpha

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BY:
ALTAYEB ABDULHAMEED IDRIS
AHMED ALI ABDULBASIT
HASSAN ABASS AHMED
AHMED OMER ATTAJ

 Reference:
Power Electronics Devices and Circuits
V. Jagannathan

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