Control Engineering Practice 24 (2014) 42–54

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Control Engineering Practice

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/conengprac

A new robust speed-sensorless control strategy for high-performance

brushless DC motor drives with reduced torque ripple
S.A.KH. Mozaffari Niapour a,n, M. Tabarraie a, M.R. Feyzi b
a
Private Research Laboratory, 71557 Shiraz, Iran
b
Faculty of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Tabriz, 51664 Tabriz, Iran

art ic l e i nf o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This paper presents an analysis, design, and strategy of a high-performance speed-sensorless control
Received 20 February 2013 scheme for estimating the phase-to-phase trapezoidal back-EMF of BLDC motor drive by means of a
Accepted 15 November 2013 novel stochastic deconvolution technique in the H1 setting, named robust stochastic H1 deconvolution
Available online 10 December 2013
filter. In the proposed method, unlike the conventional observer-based approaches, the back-EMF is
Keywords: considered as an unknown input, and no need is felt for the constancy assumption of the rotor position
H1 deconvolution filter and speed of machine within a short period of the time in the modeling of the BLDC motor which leads to
Brushless dc (BLDC) motor ignoring the back-EMF dynamic at high and variable speed. In addition, since high-speed operation is
Sensorless control vital for the motor, an improved approach has also been proposed to reduce the commutation-torque-
High-performance drive
ripple at high-speed for direct torque control (DTC) strategy of three-phase BLDC motor with 120°
Torque ripple
conduction mode in parallel with the proposed method due to the fact that drive performance intensely
downgrades in this mode.
& 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction because of extra components and wiring; (3) sensitivity of these

Brushless dc (BLDC) motors and their drives in vast range of
high-performance applications have increasingly been taken into
consideration due to their significant characteristics in different
powers ranging from microwatts to megawatts. Realization of this
important issue in these types of motors is, on the one hand,
indebted to the ever-increasing progress of permanent-magnet
technologies which has provided accessibility to high efficiency,
power density, and torque for the motors, on the other hand,
structure and special characteristics of these types of motors has
created a basis for easier control, smaller size, and low maintenance
in comparison with same-power motors. The BLDC motor drives
according to their applications require position sensors such as
Hall-effect, resolver, or absolute encoder for accurate implementa-
tion of current commutation in stator windings and/or empower-
ment of desired control. However, installation of these sensors in
the motor for meeting the control needs poses several problems for
the motor-drive system. Among the most important of these
drawbacks are as follow: (1) these sensors increase the size and
expense of the motor due to the fact that they require a particular
mechanical arrangement for installation in such a way that this
issue will be most effective where restricted-space is of utmost
importance; (2) they can reduce reliability and system robustness
n
Corresponding author. Tel./fax: þ 98 711 735 38 39.
E-mail address: s.a.kh.mozaffari.niapour@gmail.com
(S.A.KH. Mozaffari Niapour).
sensors to temperature, ambient light and contamination lead to
the limitation of motor operation; (4) difficulty of installation and
maintenance of these sensors in harsh working environment in
which motor has to deal with high vibration and high temperature.
Thus, considering the disadvantages mentioned above and power-
ful and economical accessibility of today's microprocessors, it is
worthwhile to replace sensorless control methods of the BLDC
motor drives by the drives with position-sensor.
In the two recent decades, considerable efforts have been made
for optimizing sensorless control techniques from the viewpoints of
the BLDC motor drive (Chen & Cheng, 2007; Damodharan, Sandeep,
& Vasudevan, 2008; Damodharan & Vasudevan, 2010; Fakham,
Djemai, & Busawon, 2008; Iizuka, Uzuhashi, Kano, Endo, & Mohri,
1985; Kim & Ehsani, 2004; Shen & Tseng, 2003; Shao, Nolan, Teissier,
& Swanson, 2003; Terzic & Jadric, 2001; Zhang & Wang, 2011). In
reference Iizuka et al. (1985), the terminal voltage sensing method
which is based on float phase voltage sensing with respect to virtual
neutral point was originally proposed in order to detect zero-
crossing point (ZCP) of the back-electromotive-force (back-EMF)
waveform. However, when using techniques of chopping drive in
this method, neutral point is no longer a standstill point and this
point's potential varies between zero and dc-bus voltage. A com-
pensation for the introduced phase delay of LPF in Shen and Tseng
(2003) has been reported by using frequency-independent phase
shifter which can shift ZCP of input signal by a known phase delay. In
Shao et al. (2003) the direct back-EMF detection approach which
is not in need of sensing or reconstructing motor neutral point
and uses voltage difference of unexcited phase and power ground of

0967-0661/$ - see front matter & 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.conengprac.2013.11.014
 S.A.KH. Mozaffari Niapour et al. / Control Engineering Practice 24 (2014) 42–54
dc-link voltage for direct back-EMF information elicitation has been
analyzed. In this method, sensing circuit can only operate during
freewheeling period (off-time of PWM) with a minimum off-time
3 ms sampling which results in that the maximum duty cycle of
PWM be lower than 100%. Another direct back-EMF detection
approaches to extend duty cycle control from 5% to 95% has been
proposed in Chen and Cheng (2007) by means of measurement of
line voltages without considering the back-EMF. Under an ideal
assumption that there exists no freewheeling current in non-
conducted phase, recently a simple position-sensorless technique
for detecting the back-EMF ZCPs in Damodharan and Vasudevan
(2010) and starting of the motor in Damodharan, Sandeep, and
Vasudevan (2008) are presented. This method emphasizes on the
issue that by measuring difference of line voltages in the motor
terminals, it will be possible to create amplified version of back-EMF
in order to extend its ZCPs detection at lower speeds. Unfortunately,
the considered assumptions in Damodharan and Vasudevan (2010)
and Damodharan et al. (2008) methods can not always come true; in
fact, using these methods, there may be a possibility that free-
wheeling currents in non-conducted phase exist both during normal
commutation period and during un-commutated period in such a
way that their amplitude, duration, and location of effectivity can
differ according to the type of switching method. In Zhang and
Wang (2011) a method based on proper PWM strategy (PWM-ON-
PWM) is offered in order that overcome the disadvantages in
Damodharan and Vasudevan (2010) and Damodharan et al.
(2008)). Although by using this method can realize good motor
performance over a much speed range, there is no wonder it results
in a tiny variety in application of BLDC motor drives. In Kim and
Ehsani (2004) a speed-independent new physical concept has been
proposed to detect commutation instants by utilizing speed-
independent position function. However, since this function depends
on calculations of current derivatives, this method, firstly, requires
digital implementation, and, secondly, due to the extreme sensitivity
of the method mentioned to measurement noises and machine
parameters, this issue inevitably leads to a disorder in the determi-
nation of commutation points.
Nevertheless, the strategies above-mentioned operate only in a
bounded speed range and are considered to be among open-loop
speed-sensorless methods, but observer-based methods are
mainly considered to be among closed-loop speed-sensorless
techniques which are more robust and are of high-accuracy with
respect to uncertainty in parameters and disturbances. Therefore,
observer-based drives for high-performance applications can be
the best and safest choice. In Terzic and Jadric (2001), an extended
Kalman filter (EKF) has been used for instantaneous estimation of
system state variables and stator resistance by using line actual
voltages and currents and utilizing complete model of the BLDC
motor. Unfortunately, the most basic problem for EKF is that its
robustness against parameter detuning is too weak. In addition,
determining the values of noise covariance matrices is difficult in
them, and as this method is based on having accurate knowledge
of practical system noises, the parameters determined by simula-
tion should still be adjusted in practical system which increases
the inconveniences for EKF. In Fakham et al. (2008) a sliding-mode
observer has been presented by means of the stator line voltages
and currents and electrical motor model to estimate the phase-to-
phase back-EMF of the BLDC motor. In this respect, it should be
pointed that a continuous approximation has been used for
switching sign function by applying sliding-mode observer to
drive system in order to reduce chattering effect in the method
mentioned, which results in that, on the one side, it reduces
the accuracy of observer in estimating state variables, and, on the
other side, the applied approximation is no longer effective in
the reduction of chattering effect when a high-level noise exists in
the system output.
43
In this paper, a novel robust stochastic H1 deconvolution filter
has been proposed for sensorless BLDC motor drives with the aim of
improving the robustness and dynamic performance in a vast speed
range of the conventional aforementioned methods. This innovative
deconvolution approach is the first known study that is utilized for
linear stochastic systems which contain a known input as well as
state-, input- and exogenous disturbance-dependent noise. The
proposed deconvolution filter is also extended to the case in which
the deterministic part of state space model matrices and the
covariance matrices of multiplicative noises are uncertain but reside
in a given polytope. To be more precise, the proposed observer is
used to estimate phase-to-phase trapezoidal back-EMF of the BLDC
motor by utilizing actual line voltages and currents in such a way
that the rotor speed and position can easily be obtained by the back-
EMF estimation. On the other hand, in the proposed filter the back-
EMF dynamic has been considered for gaining access to better high
and variable speed performance in contrast with the conventional
observer-based approaches which have assumed that back-EMF
variations are very slow in the modeling of the BLDC motor. Owing
to the fact that high-speed operation is one of the most important
situations that a motor should successfully undergo in order to
overcome the big commutation-torque-ripple created under this
condition, an improved approach has also been proposed to reduce
the commutation-torque-ripple at high-speed for direct torque
control (DTC) strategy of three-phase BLDC motor with 1201 con-
duction mode in parallel with the proposed method. Utilizing this
improved approach, the electromagnetic torque remains constant
without feeling any need to an accurate calculation of the duration
of the applying effective complementary controller of the varying
input voltage, and the commutation-torque-ripple, which derives
from the uncontrollable conduction of freewheeling diodes at high-
speed, is minimized. Likewise, in this paper, basic principles of
designing the proposed method has analytically been studied, and
following that, modeling of the BLDC motor and the proposed
overall drive system configuration have been presented in detail
complete with principles of its operation. At the end, the proposed
system has been simulated under different operating conditions of
the BLDC motor by computer simulation, and the performance of the
proposed control strategy have been evaluated via simulation results
from four perspectives: steady-state accuracy, dynamic performance,
parameter and noise sensitivity, and low-speed-operation perfor-
mance. Simulation results verify that the proposed system has very
good robustness and dynamic performance, high estimation accu-
racy, and low commutation-torque-ripple under different operating
conditions in spite of the existence of measurement noise and
electric parameter uncertainty. Therefore, the proposed strategy
with its strong robustness and reduced commutation-torque-ripple
makes it possible for the drive to enable the motor to undergo a
stable tensionless operation without confronting any problem at
high- and low-speeds and braking regime.
2. Modeling of BLDC motor
The BLDC motor model is described in the stationary reference
frame abc by the following equations (see Mozaffari Niapour.,
Tabarraie, & Feyzi, 2012):
2 3 21 30 2 32 3
ia  ib L 0 0 R 0 0 ia  ib
d6 7 6 7B 6 7 6 7
4 ib  ic 5 ¼ 6 7
4 0 L 0 5@  4 0 R 0 54 ib  ic 5
1
dt
ic  ia 0 0 1L 0 0 R ic  ia
2 3 2 31
ea  eb va vb
6 e  e 7 6 v  v 7C
4 b c 5þ4 b c 5A ð1Þ
ec  ea vc  va
44 S.A.KH. Mozaffari Niapour et al. / Control Engineering Practice 24 (2014) 42–54
where va , vb , vc , ia , ib , ic , ea , eb , ec , R and L are the phase voltages,
currents, back-EMFs, resistance, and inductance respectively. As
regards to the fact that equations related to phases ða  bÞ, ðb  cÞ,
and ðc  aÞ are similar, the deconvolution filter is designed for
phase ða  bÞ and then utilized for phase ðb  cÞ in a similar way for
facility purposes.
It should be noted that since the system has been considered in
a balanced way and for achieving back-EMF between the two
phases c and a ðeca Þ, we can readily utilize the equation
eca ¼  ðeab þ ebc Þ. The phase ða  bÞ equations in the state space
are written as follows by considering process and measurement
noises:
R 1 1
x_ ¼  x  ω þ u1 þ ζ 1
L L L
y ¼ x þ ζ2 ð2Þ
where x ¼ ia ib and u1 ¼ va  vb are the state and input variables
respectively, y is the actual output, and ω ¼ ea  eb is the unknown
input signal. ζ 1 and ζ 2 are the uncorrelated zero-mean white
noises that satisfy
Efζ 1 ðtÞζ 1 ðt  τÞg ¼ Q δðτÞ
Efζ 2 ðtÞζ 2 ðt  τÞg ¼ RδðτÞ
where Q and R are the covariances of noises ζ 1 and ζ 2 respectively.
3. Robust stochastic H1 deconvolution filter
The aim of deconvolution filter is the estimation of the
unknown input signal of a system by means of actual outputs
and known inputs. Deconvolution problem has comprehensive use
in environments such as equalization, image restoration, speech
processing, fault detection, see Peng and Chen (1997), Yaesh and
Shaked (2000) and You, Wang, and Guan (2011) and the references
therein. H1 deconvolution filtering has received a widespread
attention in two decades ago. One of their significant advantages is
the fact that it requires no statistical knowledge about the
exogenous disturbances, and the disturbances should only have
bounded energy. Likewise, these filters are robust against the
noises and parameter uncertainties.
Two types of uncertainties have been considered in the
literature. The first type is the deterministic uncertainties which
are commonly posed in two forms: norm-bounded uncertainty
and convex-polytopic uncertainty. Polytopic uncertainty is utilized
exhaustively in robust control and estimation of uncertain sys-
tems. In these types of uncertainties, deterministic parameters of
these systems are not known thoroughly, and it is assumed that
they lie in a given polytope (Mozaffari Niapour et al., 2012). The
second type is the stochastic uncertainties which have been
considered to be multiplicative noise or Markov jump perturba-
tions. In the case of stochastic systems with multiplicative noise,
the parameter uncertainties are modeled as white noise processes
(see Gershon, Limebeer, Shaked, & Robust, 2001; Ugrinovskii &
Petersen, 1999). Markov jump systems are efficiently used to
model the systems which sudden variations occur in their struc-
tures (Dragan & Morozan, 2004). Stochastic uncertainty in the
system under study can be considered according to inductance
model. Motions of magnetic materials which are close to each
other can induce rapid changes in the inductance value. To be
more precise, inductance Lsto ¼ Lsto ðtÞ can be modeled in the form
1
of Lsto ¼ L  1 þ Lr 1 η_ ðtÞ (Ugrinovskii & Petersen, 1999) where η_ ðtÞ is
a zero-mean Gaussian white noise with unity covariance. Further-
more, L is the phase inductance and the value of Lr is obtained
by estimation of reciprocal inductance covariance. The model
recalled for the inductance creates state-, input- and exogenous
disturbance-dependent noise in state space model.
The stochastic bounded real lemma (BRL) (Hinriechsen &
Pritchard, 1998) is of significant use in designing H1 filtering for
the linear stochastic systems. Based on this important lemma, a
proper filter has been proposed for the reduced-order H1 estimat-
ing in Xu and Chen (2002) which estimates a linear combination of
state and exogenous input signals and in Wei, Wang, Shu, and Fang
(2007) an H1 deconvolution filter has also been designed for the
linear stochastic systems with state-multiplicative noise and
deterministic interval uncertainties.
In this part of the paper, by using the stochastic BRL
(Hinriechsen & Pritchard, 1998) and linear matrix inequalities
(LMIs) techniques, we design a novel H1 deconvolution filtering
approach for linear stochastic system with known input signal as
well as state-, input- and exogenous disturbance-dependent noise.
In this filter, the worst-case energy gain from the exogenous input
signals to the estimation error is bounded by a prescribed level.
This filter is also extended to the case in which the deterministic
component of state space model matrices and the covariance
matrices of multiplicative noises are uncertain but reside in a
convex-bounded polytopic domain.
Notation: the superscript T shows matrix transposition. ℜn
determines the n-dimensional Euclidean space, and ‖ U ‖ is the
Euclidean vector norm, and ℜnm is a set of all the n  m real
matrices. The notation P 4 0 for P nn means that P is symmetric
and positive definite. Ef U g stands for expectation. The symbol n is
used for the symmetric terms in a symmetric matrix. By L2 ðΩ; ℜk Þ
we denote the space of square-integrable ℜk -valued functions on
the probability space ðΩ; ϑ; Ψ Þ, where Ω is the sample space, ϑ is a
s-algebra of subsets of the sample space, and Ψ is a probability
measure on ϑ. By ðϑt Þt 4 0 we denote an increasing family of
s-algebras ϑt  ϑ. Likewise, let L~ ð½0; 1Þ; ℜk Þ denote the space of
2
non-anticipative stochastic process f ð UÞ ¼ ðf ðtÞÞt A ½0;1Þ in ℜk with
R1
respect to ðϑt Þt A ½0;1Þ which satisfies ‖f ‖2L~ ¼ Ef 0 ‖f ðtÞ‖2 dtg ¼
R1 2
0 Ef‖f ðtÞ‖ gdt o1. It should be mentioned that stochastic differ-
2
ential equations are of Itô type.
3.1. Bounded real lemma for linear stochastic systems with
multiplicative white noise
We consider the following linear stochastic system with state-
and exogenous disturbance-dependent noise:
dxðtÞ ¼ ½AxðtÞ þB1 ωðtÞdt
þ ½G1 xðtÞ þ G2 ωðtÞdβ ðtÞ; xð0Þ ¼ x0
zðtÞ ¼ C 1 xðtÞ þ D11 ω ð3Þ
n
where x A ℜ is the system state vector, and x0 represents the
initial state. ωðtÞ A L~ ð½0; 1Þ; ℜq Þ is the exogenous input vector, and
2
m
z A ℜ is the objective vector. A, B1 , G1 , G2 , C 1 , and D11 are the
constant matrices with appropriate dimensions. β ðtÞ is a zero-
mean real scalar Wiener process which satisfies
EfdβðtÞg ¼ 0; Efdβ ðtÞ2 g ¼ dt ð4Þ
In fact, G1 β_ and G2 β_ can be interpreted as white noise
parameter perturbations in the matrices A and B1 respectively by
adopting the fact that white noise signals are formally the
derivatives of Wiener processes.
The following performance index is considered:
J E :¼ ‖z‖2L~  γ 2 ‖ω‖2L~ ð5Þ
2 2
which γ 4 0 is a given scalar.
In this part of the paper, we use the following definition:
Definition 1. The system (3) with ωðtÞ ¼ 0 is called asymptotically
mean-square stable if lim E ‖xðtÞ‖2 ¼ 0, for all x0 A ℜn .
t-1
 S.A.KH. Mozaffari Niapour et al. / Control Engineering Practice 24 (2014) 42–54 45

ω~ ðtÞ A L~ ð½0; 1Þ;

2 pþq
Now, we give the following important lemma which is cele- h ℜ Þ.iTTaking into account Eqs. (9) and (10) and
brated to the stochastic bounded real lemma. denoting ξ ¼ xT x^ T , the following augmented system, which
shows the filtering error dynamic, will be obtained:
Lemma 1. (Hinriechsen & Pritchard, 1998) The system (3) is
asymptotically mean-square stable, and J E of (5) is negative for all dξ ¼ A~ ξdt þ B~ ω
~ dt þ ½G~ 1 ξ þ G~ 2 ω
~ dβ; z~ ¼ C~ ξ þ D
~ω~ ð13Þ
nonzero ωðtÞ A L~ ð½0; 1Þ; ℜq Þ under zero initial condition if and only
2
where
if there exists Q 4 0, which satisfies " # " # " #
" T # A 0 B B1 B2
~
A¼ ~
; B¼ ¼
A Q þ Q A þ G1 T Q G1 þ C T1 C 1 Q B1 þ G1 T Q G2 þ C T1 D11 B1f C 2 Af Bf B1f D21 B2f
o0 ð6Þ
B1 T Q þGT2 Q G1 þ DT11 C 1 GT2 Q G2 þDT11 D11  γ 2 I   " #  
G1 0 G2 G2 G3
G~ 1 ¼ ; G~ 2 ¼ ¼ ;
0 0 0 0 0
h i h i
3.2. Design of stochastic H1 deconvolution filter C~ ¼ C 1  Df C 2  C f ; D~ ¼ D11  Df D21 0 ð14Þ

Now we consider the following asymptotically mean-square

stable system with stochastic uncertainties and a known input Theorem 1. Consider the system (7a)–(7c) and the deconvolution
signal: filter (8). For γ 40 the following results hold:

dxðtÞ ¼ ½AxðtÞ þ B1 ωðtÞ þ B2 rðtÞdt

i) the system (13) is asymptotically mean-square stable, and J S is
þ ½G1 xðtÞ þ G2 ωðtÞ þ G3 rðtÞdβðtÞ; xð0Þ ¼ x0 negative for all nonzero ω ~ ðtÞ A L~ ð½0; 1Þ; ℜp þ q Þ under zero initial
2

yðtÞ ¼ C 2 xðtÞ þ D21 ωðtÞ condition, if and only if there exist R ¼ RT A ℜnn , W ¼ W T A ℜnn ,
Z A ℜnr , Z A ℜnp , S A ℜnn , T A ℜmn , and Df A ℜmr such that
zðtÞ ¼ C 1 xðtÞ þ D11 ωðtÞ ð7a–cÞ
∑ðR; W; Z; Z; S; T; Df Þ o0 ð15Þ
whose description is similar to that of system (3), in addition,
r A ℜp is the known deterministic input signal and y A ℜr is the where

2 3
RA þ AT R AT W þ C T2 Z T þST RB1 RB2 GT1 R GT1 W C T1  C T2 DTf  T T
6 7
6 n  S  ST WB1 þ ZD21 WB2 þZ 0 0 TT 7
6 7
6 7
6 n n  γ 2 Iq 0 GT2 R GT2 W DT11  DT21 DTf 7
6 7
∑ :¼ 6
6 n n n  γ 2 Ip GT3 R GT3 W 0
7
7
6 7
6 n n n n R 0 0 7
6 7
6 7
4 n n n n n W 0 5
n n n n n n  Im

measurement vector. B2 , G3 , C 2 and D21 are the constant matrices ii) If (15) is satisfied, the deconvolution filter parameters can be
with appropriate dimensions. extracted using the following equations:
Now we consider the following deconvolution filter to estimate
Af ¼  W  1 S; B1f ¼  W  1 Z; B2f ¼  W  1 Z; Cf ¼ T ð16Þ
zðtÞ:
needless to say, Df is obtained of (15).
dx^ ¼ Af x^ dt þ B1f ydt þ B2f rdt; x^ ð0Þ ¼ 0; z^ ¼ C f x^ þ Df y ð8Þ
where x^ A ℜn and z^ A ℜm . in (7a) we substitute the exogenous Proof. This theorem can be proved through a trend similar to
input vector ωðtÞ with the augmented exogenous input vector those used in Gershon et al, (2001) and Yaesh and Shaked (2000).
ω~ ðtÞ ¼ ½ ωðtÞT rðtÞT T ; then have
i) According to Lemma 1, necessary and sufficient condition for
dx ¼ ½Ax þ Bω
~ dt þ ðG1 x þ G2 ω
~ Þdβ ð9Þ system (13) to be asymptotically mean-square stable, and J S to be
~ ðtÞ A L~ ð½0; 1Þ; ℜp þ q Þ, is that there exist
2
where negative for all nonzero ω
Q 4 0 that satisfies the following inequality:
B ¼ ½ B1 B2 ; G2 ¼ ½ G2 G3 
2 T 3
A~ Q þ Q A~ þ G~ 1 Q G~ 1 þ C~ C~ Q B~ þ G~ 1 Q G~ 2 þ C~ D~
T T T T
In the same way, in (8) by substituting dy of (7b) we obtain 4 5o0 ð17Þ
B~ Q þ G~ 2 Q G~ 1 þ D~ C~ G~ 2 Q G~ 2 þ D
T T
T T
~  γ 2 Ip þ q
~ TD
dx^ ¼ ½Ax^ þ B1f C 2 xdt þ Bf ω
~ dt ð10Þ
where Applying Schur complement, we obtain
Bf ¼ ½ B1f D21 B2f  2 3
A~ Q þ Q A~
T
Q B~ G~ 1 Q C~
T T
6 7
6 ~T 7
 γ 2 I p þ q G~ 2 Q
Denoting T
6 n D 7
6 7o0 ð18Þ
z~ ðtÞ ¼ zðtÞ  z^ ðtÞ ð11Þ 6 n n Q 0 7
4 5
and for a given scalar γ 4 0, the following cost function is defined: n n n  Im

J S :¼ ‖z~ ‖2L~  γ 2 ‖ω
~ ‖2~ ð12Þ  
L X M
2 2
Q and Q  1 are partitioned in the form of Q :¼ and
The aim of stochastic H 1 deconvolution filter is to seek for MT U
 
estimation z^ ðtÞ from the zðtÞ over the infinite time horizon ½0; 1Þ in Y N
Q  1 :¼ T , where we require that X 4 Y  1 .
such a way that J S of (12) is negative for all nonzero N V
46 S.A.KH. Mozaffari Niapour et al. / Control Engineering Practice 24 (2014) 42–54

 
Y In   In order to design the stochastic H 1 deconvolution filter, which
Defining J :¼ and J~ :¼ diag J; I p þ q ; J; I m , (18) is pre-
NT 0 estimates eab as the unknown input, the state space model (2)
including state-, input- and exogenous disturbance-dependent
and post-multiplied by J~ and J~ . Carrying out some multiplications
T
1
noise terms resulted from inductance model ðLsto ¼
and through the substitution of
L  1 þ Lr 1 η_ ðtÞÞ can be written in the form of (7a)–(7c) as the
following:
Z :¼ MB1f ; Z :¼ MB2f ; Z~ :¼ C f N T ; Z^ :¼ MAf N T ð19Þ
dx ¼ ½Ax þ B1 ω
^ þ B2 u1 dt þ ðG1 x þ G2 ω
^ þG3 u1 Þdη
we obtain
2 3
AY þYAT n n n n n n
6 T 7
6 A þ XAY þ ZC 2 Y þ Z^ XA þ AT X þ C T2 Z T þZC 2 n n n n n 7
6 7
6 7
6 BT1 BT1 X þ DT21 Z T  γ 2 Iq n n n n 7
6 7
6 T 7
6
6 BT2 BT2 X þZ 0  γ 2 Ip n n n 7 o0
7
ð20Þ
6 G1 Y G1 G2 G3 Y n n 7
6 7
6 7
6 XG 1Y XG1 XG2 XG3 I X n 7
4 5
C 1 Y  Df C 2 Y  Z~ C 1  Df C 2 D11 Df D21 0 0 0  Im

y ¼ C 2 x þD21 ω
^
Defining ϒ as below z ¼ C 1 x þD11 ω
^ ð27Þ
(" # " # )
R 0 R 0 where
ϒ :¼ diag ; Iq ; Ip ; ; Im ð21Þ h pffiffiffiffi i
 R In R In R 1
A ¼  ; B1 ¼  1L Q 0 ; B2 ¼ ;
L L
and substituting R h i 1
G1 ¼  ; G2 ¼  Lr 0 0 ; G3 ¼ ;
1
C 1 ¼ 0; C 2 ¼ 1;
^
S :¼ ZR; T :¼ Z~ R; R :¼ Y  1 ; W ¼ X R ð22Þ L Lr
h r pffiffiffi i
with pre- and post-multiplying (20) by ϒ and ϒ , respectively,
T D21 ¼ 0 0 R ; D11 ¼ ½ 1 0 0 
(15) is achieved. h iT
If there exists a solution to (15), from (19) we obtain that ^ ¼ ω
and ω ζ1 ζ2 with Ef½ ζ 1 ðtÞ ζ 2 ðtÞ T ½ ζ 1 ðt  τÞ ζ 2 ðt 
^ T;
Af ¼ M  1 ZN B1f ¼ M  1 Z; τÞg ¼ I 2 δðτÞ, namely, we have embedded the covariance matrices
of noises in B1 and D21 . In addition, η_ ðtÞ is not correlated with the
B2f ¼ M  1 Z; C f ¼ Z~ N  T ð23Þ other noise signals. Since the covariance matrices of the additive
Applying (23) in the transfer function matrix of the deconvolu- noises, i.e., Q and R are not available in practice, the values of the
tion filter, which is obtained of (8), we find that covariance matrix elements are used as tuning parameters. For
" # " #   simplicity and avoiding computational complexity, the covariance
H z^ y ðsÞ B1f Df matrices are chosen diagonal and constant, and they are tuned by
H deconvolver ðsÞ ¼ ¼ C f ðsI  Af Þ  1 þ
H z^ r ðsÞ B2f 0 trial and error (Mozaffari Niapour et al., 2012).
   
Z D
¼ Z~ ðsMN  ZÞ ^
T  1 f
þ
Z 0
    4. Proposed commutation-torque-ripple minimization
~ ^ 1 Z Df
method
¼ Z ðsðI n  XYÞ  ZÞ þ ð24Þ
Z 0
now owing to (22), H deconvolver is obtained as the following: In this section an improved approach has been proposed for
    reducing commutation-torque-ripple at high-speeds for DTC strat-
Z Df
H deconvolver ðsÞ ¼ TðsðR  XÞ  SÞ  1 þ egy of the three-phase BLDC motor with 1201 elec. conduction
Z 0 mode, and also the commutation current and torque ripple have
" 1
#  
1 1 ðR  XÞ Z Df been studied in similar way to the method presented in Nam, Lee,
¼ TðsI  ðR  XÞ SÞ þ ð25Þ
ðR  XÞ  1 Z 0 Lee, and Hong (2006), and only its results have been provided. The
proposed method, in fact, makes use of a combination of the
considering the relation above, (16) is obtained. methods presented in Liu, Zhu, and Howe (2007) and Nam et al.
Due to the fact that LMIs are affine in the system parameters, (2006) in such a way that the hybridization of these two methods
Theorem 1 can be extended for the case which these parameters leads to that; first, there is no need to an accurate knowledge of
are uncertain. Assume that A, B1 , B2 , C 2 , D21 , G1 , G2, and G3 reside the duration of precise applying of the controller during the
in the polytope as follows: commutation interval, second, the complimentary controller used
s s in the commutation interval is different from controllable three-
Ω :¼ ðA; B1 ; B2 ; C 2 ; D21 ; G1 ; G2 ; G3 Þ ¼ ∑ μi Ωi ; μi Z 0; ∑ μi ¼ 1 ð26Þ
i¼1 i¼1 phase switching mode, and an effective method of varying input
voltage has been used instead.
where Ωi :¼ ðAi ; B1i ; B2i ; C 2i ; D21;i ; G1i ; G2i ; G3i Þ; i ¼ 1; …; s are the
Fig. 1 illustrated the current flow paths during the commuta-
polytope vertices.
tion between phases c and a, i.e., when the switching states
Corollary 1. Consider the system (7a)–(7c) and the deconvolution change from (000110) to (100100), in such a way that these logical
~ ðtÞ A L~ ð½0; 1Þ; ℜp þ q Þ
2
filter (8). For a given γ 4 0 and for all nonzero ω values describe the switching states (“0” represents off-switch and
and for all ðA; B1 ; B2 ; C 2 ; D21 ; G1 ; G2 ; G3 Þ A Ω, J S is negative if (15) is “1” represents on-switch) of the upper and lower switches for
satisfied by a single set of ðR; W; Z; Z; S; T; λÞ for all the polytope phases a, b, and c respectively. In order to analyze the varying
vertices. In the latter case, filter matrices are obtained via (16). input voltage method, the current commutation interval is divided
 S.A.KH. Mozaffari Niapour et al. / Control Engineering Practice 24 (2014) 42–54 47

Fig. 1. Switching states and current flow of the BLDC motor. (a) Before current commutation. (b) During current commutation with freewheeling region. (c) After current
commutation with build-up region.

into freewheeling and build-up regions. While the commutation is
occurring from phase c to phase a, current ripple will not be
generated in case current of phase a is constant. In the other
words, the commutation-torque-ripple can be reduced by keeping
the un-commutated phase current constant in freewheeling
region and applying of varying direct current voltage instead of
dc voltage with fixed amplitude. Supposing the commutation
occurring from phase c to phase a, as it can be understood from
Fig. 1, all the three phases are conducting the current during the
commutation interval as long as the phase current, whose switch
has been off, does not decay to zero. In this interval, a getting-off
phase of the motor lies parallel to the getting-on phase, that is
why the off-phase freewheeling diode current drops faster than
on-phase current, the issue which causes the generation of the
commutation-torque-ripple. As the off-phase current is reaching
zero, the build-up region starts in the two on-phases, in this case,
if the electrical period of the BLDC motor rotation is shorter than
the time constant of the on-phase current, the current can not
reach its steady-state value bounded by resistance, and this region
will also be a factor for generation of the current ripple and torque.
In this method (Nam et al., 2006) the instantaneous currents
and voltages can be calculated by circuit analysis in the Laplace
domain as well as the applying of Kirchhoff's law in each of the
equivalent circuits. Finally, the current ripple and commutation
torque could be reduced by the applying of the freewheeling
varying input voltage during the freewheeling interval which have
been expressed in Eqs. (28) and (29) respectively.
V dc  f ree ¼ 3RI 0 þ 3E þ E′  3RI 0 þ 4E ð28Þ
xab ¼ xa  xb and xbc ¼ xb  xc are ab bc reference frame compo-
L 3V dc  f ree þ 2E′
T f ree ¼  ln ð29Þ
R 9RI 0 þ 3V dc  f ree þ 2E′
V dc  f ree and T f ree are the applying voltage in the freewheeling
region and the time of the freewheeling region respectively. I 0 is
0
the initial current value, E is the back-EMF value at the commu-
tation starting for ongoing phase, and E is the peak value of the
back-EMF waveform.
As it can be inferred from (29), T f ree , on the one hand, is
sensitive to the motor parameters, and, on the other hand, has
resulted under an ideal assumption that no back-EMF current
exists in the silent phase; therefore, its precise determination
seems impossible, and its calculation is difficult. To cope with this
problem, the time during which the controller of the varying input
voltage should be utilized by the criterion of the torque error ΔT,
which has been presented in Liu et al. (2007), is determined in the
proposed method. In this method during the commutation, when
ΔT r ΔT n , the varying input voltage controller is not applied;
rather, when ΔT 4 ΔT n the controller mentioned starts operating
in parallel with the proposed sensorless method for reducing the
commutation-torque-ripple. Therefore, using this improved
approach, the electromagnetic torque will be constant without
feeling any need to calculate the duration of the effective
complementary controller of the varying input voltage, and the
commutation-torque-ripple, which derives from the conduction of
uncontrollable freewheeling diodes at high-speeds, minimizes.
5. Description of the overall drives system configuration
The key issue in the DTC method in the constant torque region
for driving a BLDC motor is correct torque estimation. For a BLDC
motor whose back-EMF waveforms are non-sinusoidal (trapezoi-
dal), the electromagnetic torque can be calculated by means of
stationary reference frame as the following form (Ozturk,
Alexander, & Toliyat, 2010):
" #
3 p dψ r α dψ r β 3p 1
T em ¼ isα þ isβ ¼ ½eα isα þeβ isβ  ð30Þ
2 2 dθ e dθ e 2 2 ωe
where eα ; eβ , isα ; isβ are the motor back-EMFs and stator currents in
the stationary reference frame (αβ-axis) respectively. Since the
balanced systems in αβ reference frame require no zero sequence
term, the torque equation (30), which includes ab  bc reference
frame variables, can be obtained as the following by means of the
transformation of the proposed αβ  ðab  caÞ in Ozturk and Toliyat
(2011) and Eq. (30). Transformation of αβ  ðab  bcÞ can be written
as the following matrix form:
" # 0 2 1 1" #
xα 3 3 xab
¼@ pffiffi A ð31Þ
xβ 0 33 xbc
where xα and xβ are the stationary reference frame components,
nents, and x in (31) represents the current and back-EMF in (30).
Thus, using transformation (31), substituting its parameters men-
tioned in (30), and some algebraic manipulations the electromag-
netic torque equation (30) can be rewritten as the following form
in ab  bc reference frame:
 
1 p ½2eab þ ebc  ½2eca þ ebc 
T em ¼ iab þ ibc ð32Þ
32 ωe ωe
The overall block diagram of the proposed speed-sensorless
control drive strategy has been sketched in Fig. 2. In this control-
ling strategy, the five effective key blocks in order to provide the
proposed sensorless control scheme are: speed controller, estima-
tors of the back-EMF, speed, position, and electromagnetic torque
of the motor, torque comparator, varying input voltage comple-
mentary controller for reducing the commutation-torque-ripple at
high-speed, and switching logic that is determinant of the inverter
switching status. The block outputs of the proposed deconvolution
filter provide an estimation of the phase-to-phase back-EMFs for
detecting rotor position and speed estimation in such a way that
B1f and B2f values as well as Af , Df , C f in this block are obtained via
solving matrix inequality according to (15) and (16) respectively. In
order to detect commutation points and 1201 electrical conduction
48 S.A.KH. Mozaffari Niapour et al. / Control Engineering Practice 24 (2014) 42–54

Fig. 2. Overall block diagram of the proposed speed-sensorless control drive strategy.

Table 1
Selection of the switching status for the DTC method in the constant torque region: torque increase ðTIÞ, torque decrease ðTDÞ, and no-change in flux ðFÞ.

Sector
Fst Tst
θ1 θ2 θ3 θ4 θ5 θ6

TI V2(001001) V3(011000) V4(010010) V5(000110) V6(100100) V1(100001)

F
TD V5(000110) V6(100100) V1(100001) V2(001001) V3(011000) V4(010010)

mode signals for each active phase the following trend could be Table 2
followed. If the desired phase is considered x1 , and the motor Specifications and parameters of the BLDC motor.
nþ1 nþ2
sequence cycle direction x1 ¼ a; b; c - x2 ¼ b; c; a - x3 ¼ c; a; b is
Parameter Value Unit
focused; then it can be claimed that the conditions exn xn þ 1 40 and
exn þ 2 xn o 0 mean the positive conduction of the desired phase, and Number of poles 2 pole
the opposite of the condition mentioned should be for the DC link voltage 300 V
negative conduction of the relevant phase. Instantaneous speed Rated speed 1500 rpm
of the motor can easily obtained out of a mathematical relation- Phase resistance 0.4 Ω
Phase inductance 13 mH
ship of speed and back-EMF which itself can be achieved out of the
Load torque 3 Nm
proportion between the maximum absolute value of the phase-to- Moment of inertia 0.004 kg m2
phase back-EMF, each 601elec. of which results from eab ; eca ; ebc Torque constant 0.4 V/(rad/s)
and rotor position, and double back-EMF constant. At the same Damping constant 0.002 N m/(rad/s)
time, speed feedback derived from the proposed observer is
compared with speed reference, and then torque command 130
is generated through PI speed controller. The torque estimator is 110 Estimated
responsible for the generation or estimation of the generated 80 Actual
Back-EMF [V]

torque feedback signal, and the torque comparator, which includes 50

hysteresis controller block, is utilized for comparing torque com- 20
mand with its values. Finally, the appropriate command for the
-10
electromagnetic torque is obtained by comparing it with its
-40
corresponding demanded values via hysteresis controller. While
the motor is undergoing the high-speed operation, the key, shown -70

in Fig. 2, changes its situation from status 1 to 2 for the parallel -100
operation of the proposed complementary controller to reduce -130
commutation-torque-ripple with the proposed strategy. As it can 2 2.015 2.03 2.045 2.06 2.075 2.09 2.105 2.12 2.135 2.15

be drawn from Table 1, the inverter switching pattern is deter-
mined at any instant of time according to the torque status, which
is obtained by the regulator outputs shown in Fig. 2 as well as by
sectors determined by estimated electrical position of the rotor. In
each sector, regarding that it is assumed that the value of the
actual stator flux-linkage is identical with the value of the
reference stator flux-linkage, since only two phases of the BLDC
Time [sec]
Fig. 3. Waveforms of estimated (dashed line) and actual (solid line) steady-state
phase-to-phase back-EMF for the proposed method under full-load at rated-speed.
motor drive is excited and controlled during each 60° elec., a non-
zero voltage space vector is employed for torque increase and
decrease as demonstrated in Fig. 2.
 S.A.KH. Mozaffari Niapour et al. / Control Engineering Practice 24 (2014) 42–54
When the estimated torque value is smaller than its command
one (i.e., TI is the torque error Tst indicator), a non-zero voltage
space vector is utilized for torque increase as well as when the
estimated torque value is bigger than its command one (i.e., TD is
the indicator of Tst), another non-zero voltage space vector is used
for torque decrease. Processing torque output status, which are
functions of optimal switching logic for selecting appropriate
stator voltage vector, is performed through voltage selector for
satisfying torque output. In fact, there exist only six non-zero
stator voltage vectors for the BLDC motor drive in this method, the
non-zero stator voltage sectors that the voltage inverter can
produce. While the motor is undergoing the high-speed operation,
the key, shown in Fig. 2, changes its situation from status 1 to 2 to
accompany the operation of the proposed complementary con-
troller with the proposed strategy for reducing the commutation-
torque-ripple. In this way, with harmonic and simultaneous
operation of each of these controllers, the BLDC motor can
experience a drive with successful performance.
6. Simulation results
In order to reach an insight distinct from the whole system
performance and emphasize on the advantages of the proposed
sensorless control scheme, the motor operation needs to be
evaluated under different conditions so that a successful assess-
ment of the motor operation can be performed. The proposed
control scheme has been simulated under different operating con-
ditions of the motor. To set the gating signals of the power switches
easily and represent the real conditions in simulation as close as
possible the electrical model of the BLDC motor with R–L elements
and the inverter with power semiconductor switches considering
the snubber circuit, the simulation model has been designed in
Matlab/Simulink using the SimPower System toolbox. Moreover, the
dead-time of the inverter and non-ideal effects of the BLDC motor
are neglected in the simulation model. In the simulations, sampling
interval of 25 μs and the magnitude of the torque hysteresis band
0.1 N m have been taken into account and all simulations have been
made in the discrete time implementation. Simulation parameters of
a standard BLDC motor for testing the proposed sensorless drive
technique performance are given in Table 2.
In this part, the effectiveness of the proposed strategy will be
analyzed from four perspectives including: steady-state accuracy,
dynamic performance, parameter and noise sensitivity, and low-
speed-operation performance. The controlling parameters that
have been selected for all the simulations accomplished are as
follows: Q ¼ 1  10  2 , R ¼ 1  10  6 , ηðtÞ ¼ 0, and γ ¼ 2:7.
Speed [rpm]
Speed [rpm]
Erorr [rpm]
0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5
Time [sec]
Fig. 4. Waveforms of estimated speed (upper trace: 0.2 rpm/div), actual speed
(middle trace: 0.2 rpm/div), and speed estimation error (lower trace: 0.2 rpm/div)
for the proposed method at rated-speed.
49
3.6
Electromagnetic Torque [N.m]
3.5
3.4
3.3
3.2
3.1
3
0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4
Time [sec]
Fig. 5. Waveform of estimated electromagnetic torque for the proposed method
at rated-speed.
Estimated Speed
[rpm]
Actual Speed
[rpm]
Erorr [rpm]
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4 4.5
Time [sec]
Fig. 6. Dynamic responses of the proposed method when load torque and speed
reference change. From top to bottom: estimated speed (400 rpm/div), actual speed
(400 rpm/div), and speed estimation error (5 rpm/div).
6.1. Steady-state accuracy analysis
The first category of simulations under study in this part has
been brought to emphasize the behavioral effects of the proposed
controlling drive according to the steady-state accuracy analysis of
the motor in nominal operating conditions. Fig. 3 shows the
estimated and actual phase-to-phase back-EMF ðeab Þ under full-
load and rated-speed for the proposed method. As the figure
clearly illustrates, accuracy of the estimated back-EMF is very high
with the proposed method such that the distinction between the
estimated back-EMF error and the actual one is extremely difficult,
and also the estimation back-EMF error includes oscillations of
small amplitude with the maximum peak 7 1:8 V imposed on top
and bottom of zero. Fig. 4 depicts the estimated and actual speeds
as well as speed estimation error in the nominal operating
conditions of the motor by employing the proposed method, in
which the white dashed lines indicate the reference values of each
one of the quantities. This figure replicates a very good speed
estimation of the actual value with a very small ripple. In this state,
as Fig. 4(lower trace) delineates, the speed estimation error is
variable and its maximum value, which occurs during current
commutation instants, when there are sharp changes in phase
currents, reach less than 7 0:3 r/min, i.e., 0.04% of rated-speed.
4
Generally, the speed estimation error and the phase shift created
between the estimated and actual back-EMF values, which tacitly
mean a phase difference between quasi-square current waveforms
and trapezoidal back-EMF of the motor, bears a direct relationship
with the torque ripple produced by the motor. The estimated
50 S.A.KH. Mozaffari Niapour et al. / Control Engineering Practice 24 (2014) 42–54

electromagnetic torque waveform for the proposed method has 360

Actual
been represented in Fig. 5. Noting the 9% torque ripple, first it can
300 Estimated
be inferred that the proposed method does not suffer from any

Rotor Position [degree]

phase-shift (see Fig. 3) and second guarantees a very good 240
estimation for the motor.
180

6.2. Dynamic performance analysis

120

The second category of the simulations under investigation in 60

this section has been brought to emphasize on the effects of the
proposed sensorless control drive behavior based on dynamic 0
0.05 0.1 0.15 0.2 0.25 0.3 0.35 0.4
performance analysis of the motor according to torque and speed
Time [sec]
profiles applied to it is as follows.
Fig. 9. Waveforms of estimated (dashed line) and actual (solid line) rotor position
 Speed profile: during interval 0  1:5 s. the motor starts up in (in electrical degree) for the proposed method during start-up under full-load at
rated-speed.
nominal operating conditions at 1500 r/min; t ¼ 1:5  3 s:
acceleration and following that high-speed operation
ðV dc o4EÞ at 2500 r/min; t ¼ 3  4:5 s: deceleration and low- operation, acceleration and deceleration, has been produced due
speed operation ðV dc 4 4EÞ at 500 r/min. to the phase delay created by LPF, which is used in the proposed
 Load torque profile: during interval 0 1:5 s the motor starts to sensorless drive scheme strategy for smoothing the estimated
operate under half of the full-load (1.5 N m); t ¼ 0:75  4 s: speed that has been utilized as feedback signal in speed and
increase of the applied load to the motor and following that torque controllers. To verify such a claim, another similar test has
full-load operation (3 N m); t ¼ 4  4:5 s: decrease of the been carried out for the proposed method by establishing the
applied load to the motor and on track of it half of the full- conditions mentioned in this part without using any LPF (see
load operation. Fig. 7). Thus, as it can be understood from the figure, the LPF can
be eliminated where speed transient state is of high importance.
Fig. 6 depicts the dynamic responses of the actual speed, As it can be seen, in such state there is no phase delay between the
estimated and actual speeds, of course, in return of addition of
estimated speed, and speed estimation error for the proposed
some increase in estimation error in the steady state. The origin of
method under the above conditions. Three significant points can
the high-frequency ripples observed in this figure are the same as
be concluded from the speed estimation error viewpoint out of
the commutation notches whose frequency is six times as much as
this figure. First, the error observed in the transient instants
the electric frequency of the motor. The frequency of these
commutation notches results from the multiplication of the
Actual number of motor poles by one-twentieth of the motor speed in
Estimated
Speed [rpm]

rpm, and the relative width and depth of these notches will
increase as the speed increases. Furthermore, Figs. 8 and 9 verify
a good transient response for the proposed method in the back-
EMF estimation and electric position of the rotor in the operating
transient instants of the motor. As the figures demonstrate, the
estimated back-EMF and rotor position fully match with their
values, and this issue is another verification for the claim made
Erorr [rpm]

above. Second, although a load torque step-change has been

applied to the motor at 0.75 and 4 s for testing the sensorless
drive response, and the motor experience an undershoot and
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4 4.5 overshoot less than 7 14 r/min approximately within a short
Time [sec] period of time, according to Fig. 6, it should be evident that no
Fig. 7. Dynamic responses of the proposed method when load torque and speed
error of the steady state is found in the motor speeds after passing
reference change without using LPF. From top to bottom: estimated and actual the undershoot and overshoot. This issue means that the proposed
speed (400 rpm/div), and speed estimation error (2 rpm/div). sensorless drive strategy has a good stability against un-modeled
mechanical disturbances of the motor. Another point is that a few
140 overshoots, which emanate from a big rapid transient response in
Actual the back-EMF estimation, are observed in the transient states (see
105
Estimated Fig. 6) in response to speed profile. In explanation for that, it
70
should be pointed that the observers used in the BLDC motor
Back-EMF [V]

35 drives require a high enough gain for convergence, which cause it

0 to peak to big values before the transient response rapidly decays
towards zero. This impulsive-like behavior is recognized as the
-35
peaking phenomenon (Sussmann & Kokotovic, 1991).
-70
As it was expected, the proposed method has acted much
-105 successfully in response to high-speed operation, and the motor
-140 can experience a stable operation, as Fig. 6 reveals it. In such state,
0 0.02 0.04 0.06 0.08 0.1 0.12 0.14 0.16 0.18 0.2 the speed estimation error is restricted between 7 0:9 r/min limits
Time [sec] for proposed method. Since commutation currents form in an
Fig. 8. Waveforms of estimated (dashed line) and actual (solid line) transient
inharmonic and distorted manner in high-speed operation mode,
behavior phase-to-phase back-EMF for the proposed method during start-up under this speed ripple might be justified as the motor be affected by a
full-load at rated-speed. current noise at high-speed, and the proposed method can easily
 S.A.KH. Mozaffari Niapour et al. / Control Engineering Practice 24 (2014) 42–54 51

Torque [N.m] Currents [A] & DC Link Voltage [V]

1500 rpm

Estimated Speed [rpm]

ia ib ic

-1500 rpm

Estimated Speed [rpm]

1500 rpm

Actual Speed [rpm]

Commutation Torque Ripple -1500 rpm

3.4 3.405 3.41 3.415 3.42 3.425

0 1 2 3 4 5 6
Time [sec]
Time [sec]
Fig. 10. Voltage waveform of dc bus (upper dashed line trace: 50 V/div), phase
Fig. 12. Estimated (upper trace) and actual (lower trace) speed response using the
currents (middle trace: 2 A/div), electromagnetic torque (lower trace: 0.2 N m/div):
proposed method, when the demanded speed is varied from 1500 to  1500 r/min
without using proposed complementary control method at 2500 rpm.
(500 rpm/div).
Currents [A] & Dc Link Voltage [V]

8
Vdc
Actual
6
Estimated
Electromagnetic Torque [N.m]

ia ib ic 4

-2
Torque [N.m]

Commutation Torque Ripple

-4

-6

3.4 3.405 3.41 3.415 3.42 3.425

-8
Time [sec] 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4
Time [sec]
Fig. 11. Voltage waveform of dc bus (upper dashed line trace: 65 V/div), phase
currents (middle trace: 1 A/div), electromagnetic torque (lower trace: 0.2 N m/div): Fig. 13. Dynamic torque response using the proposed method, when the
using proposed complementary control method at 2500 rpm. demanded torque varied from 3 to  3 N m in every 0.5 s.

confront it. It is not surprising that due to such situation of the can almost decrease to its half value by utilizing the proposed
commutation currents and speed estimation error, the torque drive strategy.
ripple at 2500 r/min increases to 15.5% value in comparison with Another test has been allocated in order to evaluate the motor
rated-speed for the proposed method. In order to overcome the and braking operations of the proposed strategy at 71500 r/min,
aforementioned commutation-torque-ripple or torque dips at as shown in Fig. 12. In this test, the machine is operated for 3 s at
high-speed, the proposed complementary controller starts operat- 1500 r/min, and then its speed reference value is reversed to
ing in parallel with the proposed sensorless method for reducing  1500 r/min, while the load torque has been kept constant
the commutation-torque-ripple. Figs. 10 and 11 show the simula- (braking mode). Fig. 12 shows the estimated and actual speeds,
tion results for waveforms of dc-bus voltage, phase currents, and again as evident, the estimated speed has a good accordance with
electromagnetic torque without and with utilizing the proposed its actual value in both regimes. The speed estimation error
method to reduce commutation-torque-ripple at 2500 r/min remains between 7 0:3 r/min limits during the braking operation
respectively. As it is clear from Fig. 10, the controller has not been mode, and this issue indicates that the proposed filter is by no
able to cope with high-speed commutation current ripple of the means affected by the reverse state and is not sensitive to the
motor during commutation interval without applying the pro- speed transient states.
posed complementary control even by utilizing the DTC method Fig. 13 illustrates the dynamic response of the estimated and
such that this issue has lead to the formation of an undesired actual torques by using the proposed method when the torque
commutation-torque-ripple (15.5%) for the motor. This exists command changes from 3 to  3 N m in each 0.5 s, and the speed
whereas, as shown in Fig. 11, current ripple and consequently is kept constant at 1500 r/min. It is seen from Fig. 13 that the
commutation-torque-ripple of the motor have intensely decreased actual torque is almost controlled within the hysteresis band and
to 9.3% value of the load average torque by applying the proposed rapidly follows its reference value (less than 0.04 s) while com-
complementary approach in the commutation interval which has pared with the conventional current control methods. The torque
been marked by dashed line in this figure. Hence, the torque ripple estimation error maximizes to 7 0:1 N m value for the transient
52 S.A.KH. Mozaffari Niapour et al. / Control Engineering Practice 24 (2014) 42–54
Erorr [rpm]
Erorr [rpm]
0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5
Time [sec]
Fig. 14. Waveforms of speed estimation error under full-load sensorless operation
at rated-speed for resistance detuning. From top to bottom: proposed method
with þ 40% deviation (0.5 rpm/div), proposed method with  40% deviation
(0.5 rpm/div).
Erorr [rpm]
Erorr [rpm]
0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5
Time [sec]
Fig. 15. Waveforms of speed estimation error under full-load sensorless opera-
tion at rated-speed for inductance detuning. From top to bottom: proposed
method with þ 15% deviation (2 rpm/div), proposed method with  30% deviation
(3 rpm/div).
states, whereas this value oscillates between 7 0:025 N m for the
steady state. It is worth to note that the torque overshoots
observed in Fig. 13 are translated from the speed to the torque
due to the peaking phenomenon.
6.3. Parameter and noise sensitivity analysis
Since parameter detuning, modeling error, and measurement
noise are among the most important disturbances which affect the
observer's accuracy, in this section, another test based on sensitivity
to parameters and noise has been carried out on the system for
analyzing the robustness of the proposed system against the
disturbances. In sensorless drives based on the observer in the BLDC
motors, stator phase resistance R and phase inductance L are used
as constant parameters of the model in estimating state variables.
Nevertheless, the stator resistance can be deviated a lot from their
nominal values due to skin-effect, temperature variation, and the
inductance due to flux-saturation, demagnetization effect, and
other disturbances. Fig. 14 demonstrates the waveforms of the
speed estimation error in full-load and rated-speed for resistance
increase and decrease ( 7 40% R) for the proposed method. As it is
self-evident from the figure, the proposed method is not sensitive
to resistance detuning, and under such a test, maximum speed
error oscillates between 7 0:5 r/min and 7 0:75 r/min values for
resistance increase and decrease respectively. It seems necessary
to point that the rest of the tests accomplished in this part have
been performed for similar condition, i.e., under full-load and
rated-speed. Similarly, Fig. 15 reports the results of the sensorless
drive sensitivity tests in contrast with inductance uncertainty for
the proposed method. As it can be seen, the proposed method is
robust against the overestimation (15%) of L and underestimation
(  15%) of L, and these mentioned parameter variations create
Speed [rpm]
Erorr [rpm] Speed [rpm]
4
0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4
Time [sec]
Fig. 16. Waveforms of speed estimation error under full-load sensorless operation
at rated-speed for 40% noisy current measurement. From top to bottom: esti-
mated speed (5 rpm/div), actual speed (5 rpm/div), and speed estimation error
(5 rpm/div).
Speed [rpm]
Speed [rpm]
4
Erorr [rpm]
0.25 2.25 4.25 6.25 8.25 10.25 12.25 14.25 16.25 18.25 20
Time [sec]
Fig. 17. Full-load sensorless operation at 15 r/min with the proposed method. From
top to bottom: estimated speed (0.05 rpm/div), actual speed (0.05 rpm/div), and
speed estimation error (0.05 rpm/div).
very small disturbances in speed estimation such that the speed
estimation error reaches 7 1:9 r/min and 73:4 r/min respectively
in this state. According to the results obtained in this part it can be
claimed that the proposed method could create a very satisfactory
compromise between the existence of uncertainty in electric
parameters and speed accuracy required for the system in such a
way that it does not require an online estimation of electric
parameters for gaining access to a good speed accuracy in contrast
to the conventional observer methods. This issue will inevitably
decrease the complexity of the calculation power of the control-
lers. It is worth mentioning that the variations considered in this
category may not be realistic, yet they have been used only for
studying the estimation performance.
The second category of tests accomplished in this section has
been brought forth for analyzing the capability of the proposed
method under the applying conditions of current measurement
noise. In order to realize such a test, a uniform random noise with
zero-mean and intensity of 0.4 have been added to ia and ib
currents separately, and the results of the test under full-load and
rated-speed have been exhibited in Fig. 16. According to this figure,
as expected, the proposed method shows to be of strong robust-
ness in face of measurement noises such that the speed estimation
error created in this state varies between 7 6:5 r/min values, and
this can be another emphasis on the features of the proposed
method. Regarding these relatively small ripples generated for the
proposed method under aforementioned test, there is no wonder
to expect an acceptable behavior of the motor drive.
 S.A.KH. Mozaffari Niapour et al. / Control Engineering Practice 24 (2014) 42–54
1.5
1
Back-EMF [V]
0.5
0 estimated and actual responses of the phase-to-phase back-EMF,
-0.5
-1
-1.5
1 3 5 7 9 11 13
Time [sec]
Fig. 18. Waveforms of estimated (dashed line) and actual (solid line) behavior of
the phase-to-phase back-EMF for the proposed method under low-speed-
operation.
360
300
Rotor Position [degree]
240
180
120
60
0 have to be applied. Among the simplest of them, for instance two
1 3 5 7 9 11 13
Time [sec]
Fig. 19. Waveforms of estimated (dashed line) and actual (solid line) behavior of
the rotor position for the proposed method under low-speed-operation.
6.4. Low-speed-operation performance analysis
The last category of the simulations under study in this section
has been allocated to low-speed-operation performance since it is
one of the most challenging tests and the most critical situations
for a sensorless BLDC motor drive. One of the most important
reasons that make the estimation of the state variables proble-
matic in very low speeds where the excitation amplitude is low, is
that in these conditions the observer's sensitivity to the parameter
variations especially the resistance increases. However, resistive
voltage drop is smaller than stator voltage in high-speed operation
range; consequently, the back-EMF and speed estimation can be
performed with high accuracy. In contrast, in low-speed regime,
the observer faces the serious problem of considerable effect of the
resistive voltage drop against low stator voltage or increase in the
proportion of noise to actual signals. Thus, in order to achieve an
accurate estimation in very low-speed-operation mode for the
sensorless scheme under analysis in this paper, it is self-evident
that the observer that is of a high robustness against sensitivity to
electrical parameters will act successfully. Fig. 17 depicts the full-
load sensorless operation with the proposed method at 15 r/min
(1% of rated-speed) for the actual and estimated speeds and speed
estimation error. As the figure clearly and expectedly shows, the
estimated speed replicates the speed by a tiny ripple such that the
oscillation ripple of the speed estimation error restricts in
70:12 r/min values, i.e., 2.4% of the speed under study. This small
speed ripple, on the one hand, indicates a very good estimation of
the back-EMF and, on the other hand, verifies the statements
concerning the observer's success with more robustness in face of
the electric parameter uncertainty. The small ripples observed in
Fig. 17 recall the worthwhile point that the proposed filter does
53
not confront with severe oscillations in zero-crossing instants; in
Actual the other words, the proposed method acts very precisely in the
Estimated accurate estimation of the back-EMF during commutation instants.
Interesting to point that the ripple of the system decreases as the
load applied to the motor decreases. Figs. 18 and 19 depict the
and rotor position under low-speed-operation, respectively.
Figs. 18 and 19 depict the estimated and actual responses of the
phase-to-phase back-EMF, and rotor position under low-speed-
operation, respectively. The figures verify a good response for the
proposed method in the back-EMF estimation at low-speed-
15 17 19 20 operation of the motor operation, and the estimated parts are
well in accordance with the actual ones in such a way that the
distinction between them is very difficult. This proves that
the introduced results for the sensorless operation at very low
speeds, due to the excellent robustness and high estimation
accuracy can provide excellent performance in another stressful
condition for the motor by presenting a very low back-EMF, and
position rotor ripples.
Actual Since the sensorless schemes are not self-starting, speed-
sensorless methods can not be applied well when the motor is
Estimated
at standstill. Thus, a starting procedure is needed to start the
motor from standstill. Most of these starting strategies are based
on arbitrarily energizing the two or three windings and expecting
the rotor to align to a certain definite position (Asaei and Rostami,
2009; Damodharan et al., 2008; Iizuka et al., 1985; Jang, Park, &
Chang, 2002; Lee & Sul, 2006; Moreira, 1996). Consequently, for
the motor starting, one of the already known procedures would
15 17 19 20 phases can be excited to result in the rotor to rotate and lock into
position. If the rotor is not in the desired position, the forcing
torque from the excited phases causes it to rotate and stop at the
desired position. After prepositioning, the next commutation
signal advancing the switching pattern by 60 electrical degrees
is applied. Then instantaneously the proposed speed-sensorless
scheme can be taken over to detect the next commutation instant.
With regard to the reasons mentioned about the proposed method
in the section, the 60 electrical degrees rotor movement is enough
to detect the commutation instants and speed of the motor. After
the first detection of the commutation instant, both current and
speed control is possible using the estimated speed.
6.5. Comments on computational complexity
In this section the proposed filter has been compared with two
conventional sensorless methods in BLDC motor drives, is that,
Kalman filter and sliding-mode observers from computational
complexity point of view. For the Kalman filter and sliding-mode
observers, there are three and two parameters that should be
regulated respectively, and for proposed method the number of
these parameters is three. Alternatively, there are only sum and
product for sliding-mode while computation process also consists
of matrix product and inverse for Kalman filter method. However,
for proposed method the condition will exacerbate in comparison
with Kalman filter method because in addition to multiplying
matrix by its inverse it needs to be solved by LMI. The LMI can be
solved rapidly and user-friendly manner by using efficient numer-
ical algorithm and software package such as MATLAB. It should be
noted that the calculation time for proposed method can drama-
tically be decreased by optimization of LMI's algorithm and
programmer's ability which is easy to obtain with nowadays
microcontrollers of DSP systems. One more thing that deserves
to be mentioned is that the use of DSP for similar on-line
complicated mathematical computations has been reported in
different references such as Lain, Chiang, and Tu (2007) and Zhu,
Kaddouri, Dessaint, and Akhrif (2001). Nonetheless, what can have
54 S.A.KH. Mozaffari Niapour et al. / Control Engineering Practice 24 (2014) 42–54
more effect on computation time is on-line structure of estimator.
In this respect, the sliding-mode and proposed methods suffer
from using saturation function and extra matrix product, respec-
tively with respect to Kalman filter method.
On the other hand, the sliding-mode method has superiority
over the Kalman filter and proposed methods from computation
complexity parameter tuning point of view, while the Kalman
filter method is very beneficial in computation time perspective in
comparison with sliding-mode and proposed methods. In conclu-
sion, the proposed control scheme enhances robustness and
accuracy of the drive system at the expense of more computational
complexity and adjusting some more additional parameters com-
pared to Kalman filter and sliding-mode methods.
7. Conclusion
In this paper a strategy has been presented for designing a
BLDC motor speed sensorless control based on a novel robust
stochastic H 1 deconvolution filter and a complementary control-
ler for the purpose of torque ripple reduction and drive perfor-
mance promotion. The innovative deconvolution filter is derived
using the stochastic bounded real lemma for the linear stochastic
system with state- and input- and exogenous disturbance-
dependent noise. The proposed deconvolver has also been applied
to the case where, in addition to the stochastic uncertainty, other
deterministic parameters of the system are uncertain and reside in
a given polytope. Based on the simulation results, the proposed
deconvolution filter and generally the proposed strategy proves to
have a high robustness, very low sensitivity, excellent estimation,
and reduced torque-ripple in response to all scenario considered
for evaluating the performance of the motor. Thus, regarding the
successful operation results, the proposed sensorless drive strat-
egy with its high robustness and elimination of any limitation in
the back-EMF dynamic can make it possible for the drive to
conduct the motor toward a stable tensionless operation in various
high-performance applications in a vast speed range.
Acknowledgements
The first and second authors would like to thank their parents
separately for all their spiritual and financial supports. Further-
more, they would like to express their sincere and ultimate
gratitude to Prof. M. R. Feyzi for his patient guidance, continued
support, encouragement, and advice he has provided in all stages
of preparing the paper.
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