The 7th International Conference on Power Electronics WED2·1

October 22-26, 2007 / EXCO, Daegu, Korea

ROBUST SPEED SENSORLESS INDUCTION MOTOR DRIVES

Geetha E.K T.Thyagarajan, Professor MIT Vedam Subrahmanyam

RMKEC Chennai Chromepet, Chennai Professor, RMKEC, Chennai
gita_ramadas@yahoo.com Member, IEEE Member, IEEE

Abstract- Induction motors are widely used in industry due to

the fact that they are relatively cheap, rugged and maintenance
free. As a consequence, much attention has been given to the
motor torque and speed control. The control schemes available
today require information regarding speed of the motor, which
can either be obtained by using speed sensors or without speed
sensors. Speed sensors have several disadvantages from the
standpoint of drive cost, reliability, inertia and noise immunity.
Advantages of eliminating speed sensors thus have been a
strong motivation to develop speed sensor less induction motor
drives for industrial drives. Several control strategies of sensor
less control are available in literature. This paper is an attempt
to explore the possibility of estimation of rotor speed with the
help of extended Kalman filter trained recurrent Neural
Network. The speed estimation is made robust by
simultaneously adapting the rotor resistance and rotor flux
which are also done by the same Neural Network. The training Fig-2. Sensorless Vector Control
is very fast as it requires only one iteration. The proposed
scheme is studied on an induction motor and it gives better
One of the most well known methods used for speed sensor
performance as compared to the already existing algorithms in
the literature. less field oriented control of induction motor is by using the
Key words: Kalman Filter, Neural Networks, Robust Speed Extended Kalman Filter (EKF) [2, 3]. Also, the same EKF is
sensor less operation, Vector control used for estimation of rotor resistance and ,rotor flux along
with the estimation of rotor speed there by making the
1. INTRODUCTION performance robust[4].Neural networks, having the ability
Field Oriented control of an Induction motor is to learn and process information in the same way as brain
best suited for dynamic performance improvement. does, can be advantageously used for speed estimation[5,6].
Information regarding the speed of induction motor is Extended Kalman filtering techniques (EKF) can be used to
essential for field oriented control. Conventional field train the neural network which can be used for accurate
oriented control schemes use electromechanical speed estimation of speed and rotor resistance, if necessary,
sensors (Fig. 1). Speed sensor has several disadvantages simultaneously. This method takes least time to train neural
from the standpoint of drive cost, reliability, inertia, and network and hence, can be used for real time application
noise immunity .Also it may not be possible to maintain with robust performance. Kalman filter is an optimum speed
perfect decoupling due to rotor time constant for some estimator. A block diagram of speed estimation based on a
reason or other.. This has led to the concept of speed sensor Kalman filter is shown in Figure 3. By adapting this
less field oriented control (Fig.2) in which speed is algorithm, rotor resistance and speed can be accurately
estimated from the terminal voltages and currents [1]. estimated without additional computational effort (Fig 4)

~\I( ~ i"
4,

FEr
.r(t) - ..a(t) + .B~(t) + (H1(t) Is
Vs x
~ (t) - CZ'(t)+ ~

.r(t) - [i~(t) 2·r (t) a:a,.(t)]t

"'''_
_ Induction Motor Vs Kalman Filter

FigJ Block Diagram Representation of the proposed Scheme

Fig-I. Conventional Indirect Vector Control

978-1-4244-1872-5/08/$25.00 ©20081EEE 806

The 7th International Conference on Power Electronics
October 22-26, 2007 I EXCO, Daegu, Korea

Fig-4. Sensorless Control with Rotor Resistance identification

'q5." )
The aims of this paper are Fig 5 Real Time recurrent Neural Network
1. To develop a speed identification using Kalman
Filter(KF) trained recurrent neural network. the weights of the network. The outputs of the network can
2. To make the speed estimation robust by be expressed as
simultaneously estimating the rotor resistance and
If!dr = It (net l )
applying the same to the speed estimation. This (4)
will enable perfect decoupling. If/qr = 12 (net 2)
where
II SPEED IDENTIFICATION PRINCIPLE
(net l ) = ~llf!dr (k -1) + ~2lf!qr (k -1) + ~3ids (k -1)
The speed estimation using Kalman filtering techniques is (net 2) = W21 1f!dr (k -1) + W22 1f!qr (k -1) + W31 iqs (k -1)
based on the following two expressions.

~[~:J= ~: ~J-Rs ~:[~:J-a Lt ~[~::J (1)

And f t and f2 are activation functions of the output neurons,
which are linear with unity gain .Because only two out of
the six weights contain speed term, it is enough to train only
these two weights. However, to estimate rotor resistance,
-R
L:::_r L
along with speed, the other terms containing rotor resistance

Lr[~dSJ
r
dtd[\}IdrJ qr + mR
:drJ also should be trained.
'Pqr ==
liJ
lqs (2)
III PARAMATER BASED EKF ALGORITHM FOR
r Lr TRAINING NEURAL NETWORK
The former is solved for flux variables from voltage and
currents. The latter is solved for flux variables from speed Parameter estimation problem can considered as a neural
and currents. Flux calculated from both the equations are network training problem. The estimation scheme is
compared and speed in second equation is adjusted till both formulated based on the concept of minimizing the error
the flux variables match. Eqn.(2) is descretised and vector obtained as the difference between functions of the
represented as real time neural network as given in Fig. 5. network output nodes and desired values of these functions.
The descretised equation is Let the desired value at kth instant be
d[k] = [dl(k) d 2(k) KK DN(k)]T (5)
and the vector
f(k)=[~(netl) f2(net 2) KK fN(netN)]T (6)
Denote a vector of functions of the network outputs. The
(3) training cost function is given by
E(k) = O.5e(k)T s(k) e(k) (7)
Where s(k) is user specified non negative weighting matrix
and e (k) = d (k)- f (k) is the error vector.
The trainable weights of the network are arranged into
M xN dimensional vector W (k) .An error covariance matrix
The outputs of the network are the fluxes calculated using p(k) is stored and updated at every step. This is used to
(2) and the desired outputs are those calculated using (1). model the correlation between each pair of weights in the
The errors between the two are used for updating network. The matrix p (k) is stored and updated at every
step. This is used to model the correlation between each pair

2
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The 7th International Conference on Power Electronics
October 22-26, 2007 / Exeo, Daegu, Korea

of weights in the network. The matrix p (0) is initialized as a

diagonal matrix. If.. =~.l!;netl) =i (k-l)
The training procedure is summarized as given below. ~13 t5w(netd &13 ds
1. The input signals and the recurrent node outputs
are propagated through NN and the functions f(k) /f2 =~.l!;net2) =VI (k-l)
are calculated. ~21 a.v(net )
2
a.v 21 dr
2. The error vector e(k) is calculated and the dynamic
derivatives of each component of f(k) are formed
with respect to the current weight estimates W (k). /f2 = ~. l!;net2) = VI (k -1)
These derivates are arranged in to M xN matrix H ~22 ~(net2) a.v 22 qr

(k).
3. then the W(k) and p(k) are updated using the /f2 = ~. l!;net2) = i (k -1)
following global EKF recursion formulae ~23 ~(net2) &23 qr
1
A(k)=[~k) s(k)-l +H(k)T Ak) H(k)r
Rotor resistance and rotor speed can be calculated as
K(k)=Ak) H(k) A(k)
(8) R r (k) = (1- WIl (k)) L r
W(k+ 1) =l1(k) +K(k) e(k) ts
(13)
Ak+1)=Ak)-K(k) H(k)T Ak)+(Jk) W (k) = W 21 (k)
Where 11 (k) is a scalar learning rate parameter, which along r t
s
with s (k) establishes the learning rate. The matrix A (k) is
IV RESULTS
established as the inverse of M xN matrix. It is used for
Simulation and experimental tests have been carried out
calculating the Kalman gain matrix. The weights are
using the indirect field oriented control scheme of Fig.4.
updated by adding the previous weight matrix, the product
Actual speed is measured from the experimental set up
of K (k) and e (k). K(k) is used for updating the error co
Terminal voltages and currents are evaluated at every
variance matrix.Q (k) is a diagonal covariance matrix that
sampling instant (simulation). The same terminal voltages
provides a mechanism by which the effects of artificial
and currents are given as inputs to the neural network speed
process noise are included in the Kalman recursion.
estimator. The effectiveness of speed estimation scheme has
In the present work, it can be identified that
been tested for different operating conditions. It is found
d(k) = [VIdr (k) Vlqr (k)Jr (9) that in all cases, the estimated speed agrees with the actual
which is evaluated using Eqn.( 1) at kth instant. speed. The applied load has characteristics as shown in Fig.6
(a).At the moment of application of load, there is a dip in
1 (k) = [j; (net 1) 12 (net 2 ) ]T ( 10) speed. Similarly, at the moment of removal of load, there is
Error vector is a small overshoot in speed. But, during both the above
e(k) = d(k) - I(k) (11 ) transient conditions, recovery to original speed is very
quick. There is no error between the between the measured
The trainable weight matrix is speed and the estimated speed (Fig.6(b) & Fig 6 (c)).
W(k) =[l111(k) l112(k) l113(k) W21 (k) W22 (k) l113(k)]T In order to test the rotor resistance estimation, it is
assumed that the value of rotor resistance is not known
The dynamic derivative matrix is obtained as
exactly. Simulation is started with a resistance value in
estimation and control parts different from the actual value
fft fft fft 0 0 0
used in machine modeling. It is found that the combined
speed and rotor resistance estimation process resulted in fast
&v11 &v12 &v13
H(k) = (12)
q; /f2 /f2
convergence to its actual value. This confirms to parameter
insensitivity of rotor resistance variation with respect to
0 0 0
&21 &v22 &23
speed estimation. The characteristics obtained from
simulation and experiment are exactly the same and hence
Where
error is zero (Fig.7(a) & Fig.7 (b)).
If.. =~.l!;netl) =Vldr(k-l) The procedure is repeated for reverse speed operation
also. Reference speed is changed from 30Orad/s to zero -
£5»;11 &(net l ) ~11 30Orad/sec and then back to 300rad/s. The estimated along
with actual speed is shown in Fig 8(a)
If.. =~.l!;net2) =VI (k-l)
£5»;12 ~(net2) ~11 qr

808
The 7th International Conference on Power Electronics
October 22-26, 2007 / Exeo, Daegu, Korea

zIi
.Ei
~
...
1

time in sec
Time in seconds Fig 7(b) Actual and estimated speed
Fig.6(a) Applied Torque Characteristics.

}JlI
j.~::~
!'V:
::D~

'(Ill i
4 ( ..,;~ ~:---=--=----"""~,= -,---=-e,-.,...
- •.."-
• .,,,...,---"-.-"-,~""'--""'Q-.~·'''''i;J '"

Fig.8 Actual and Estimated Speed

V.CONCLUSIONS
1'1 <.1.

Time in seconds
Fig.6 (b) Actu81 speed
}~,--------~---:"-.....-_-
speed in rad/sec
Fig.6 (c) Estimated Speed.
The Kalman Filter trained real time recurrent NN is found
to provide accurate estimation of speed as well as rotor
resistance. This makes the speed estimation robust and
provides perfect decoupling in field oriented control
schemes. The main features of the proposed method over the
conventional method are
1. Does not depend on time consuming off line
training.
2. Estimation process is complete in one cycle of
training algorithm. Hence, method is faster in real
time applications.
3. Separate rotor resistance identifier is not required
since speed estimation and rotor resistance
identification are carried out simultaneously.
EXPERIMENTAL SET UP

Motor Details: 1.1 kW, 3 phase, 60 Hz, 4 pole,200V,

Ro = 3.3534 ohms, Rr = 1.991 ohms, Lo = 170.67mH,
Lm =I63.73mH, 4= 163.73mH , J = 0.005n-m 2 Is

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

The authors acknowledge the financial support rendered by

the Management of RMK Engineering College, Chennai,
I"r.
India. Also, the authors express their sincere gratitude to Mr.
Fig.7(a) Actual & estimate d rotor re sistanc e T Ashok Kumar and Mr. E Kaliappan , faculty, Electrical
Department, RMK Engineering College, for helping them
in preparing the final manuscript.
- - estimated valUE

809
The 7th International Conference on Power Electronics
October 22-26, 2007 / Exeo, Daegu, Korea

REFERENCES

[1] Toshiyuki Kanmachi and Isao-Takshashi,

"Sensor less speed control of an Induction Motor"
IEEE Industry Applications Magazine Jan/Feb
1995.

[2] A. Mendoza, R. Arnanz, M.A. Pacheco, and IR.

Penin (Spain) "Diagnosis and Control in Induction
Motor with Extended Kalman Filter" Proceeding
(377) Modeling, Identification, and Control - 2003

[3] Salomon Chavez Vehizquez, Ruben Alejos

Palomares,Alfredo Nava Segura "Speed estimation
of an Induction Motor using the Extended Kalman
Filter" Proceedings of the 14th International
Conference on Electronics, Communications and
Computers (CONIELECOMP) 2004 IEEE p.63

[4] G. Garcia Soto,l E. Mendes,l and A. Razek

"Reduced-order observers for rotor flux, rotor
resistance and speed estimation for vector
controlled induction motor drives using the
extended Kalman filter technique",lEE Proceedings
- Electric Power Applications -- May 1999 --
Volume 146, Issue 3, p. 282-288

[5] Razik, H.; Rezzoug, A. "Neural networks applied

to the control of an induction motor"
Power Electronics Congress, 2000. CIEP2000.
VII IEEE International Volume, Issue, 2000
Page(s):60 - 64

[6] H.A.F. Mohamed and S. Yaacob "Identification

and Control of an Induction Motor using Artificial
Neural Networks From Proceeding (529) Control
and Applications - 2006

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