Position Tracking System with Brushless DC Motor

Zin Ko Oo

Department of Electrical Power Engineering, Defence Services Technological Academy, Myanmar

Abstract- Brushless DC (BLDC) motors are preferred A. Construction of BLDC Motor

as small horse power control motors due to their high
efficiency, silent operation, compact form, reliability, The BLDC motor is also referred to as an electronically
and low maintenance but it is a non-linear system whose commuted motor. It is constructed with a permanent
internal parameter values will change slightly with magnet rotor and wire wound stator poles. The BLDC
different input commands and environments. Usually in motor is a dc motor turned inside out, so that the field is on
these motors speed control is achieved by using the rotor and the armature is on the stator. There are no
proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controller being brushes on the rotor and the commutation is performed
simple in structure but PID controllers require precise electronically at certain rotor positions. The stator phase
linear mathematical models. Ziegler-Nichols based PID windings are inserted in the slots (a distributed winding), or
controller for position tracking and BLDC motor are can be wound as one coil on the magnetic pole. The
modeled and simulated in MATLAB/SIMULINK. construction of modern brushless motors is very similar to
the ac motor, known as the permanent magnet synchronous
Keywords: BLDC motor; Hall sensors; PID Controller; motor. The stator windings are similar to those in a
Ziegler-Nichols Tuning method; Mathematical model polyphase ac motor, and the rotor is composed of one or
more permanent magnets. Brushless dc motors are different
I. INTRODUCTION from ac synchronous motors in that the motor is to detect
the rotor position (or magnetic poles) to produce signals to
BLDC motors are widely used in servo applications control the electronic switches as shown in Fig.6. The most
due to their favorable electrical and mechanical properties. common position/pole sensor is the Hall element, but some
In linear system model, controller parameters of the PID motors use optical sensors.
controller are easy to determine and resulting good control
performances. A complete simulation model with potential
integral derivative (PID) control method for BLDC motor
drive is proposed using SIMULINK.

II. PROBLEM STATEMENTS

This paper presents for the position tracking to the

target using BLDC motor for a gun turret system. The
motor model was designed to rotate and elevate the gun
platform and turret Simulation of the position of the control Fig. 1 Construction of BLDC motor
structure is carried out within MATLAB-SIMULINK
software. The conventional control scheme such as
proportional (P), proportional integral (PI) and proportional B. Operating Principle of BLDC Motor
integral derivative (PID) have been developed for position
control of BLDC motors. A BLDC Motor is a permanent magnet synchronous
motor that uses position detectors and an inverter to control
the armature currents. Its armature is in the stator and the
III. BRUSHLESS DIRECT CURRENT MOTOR
magnets are on the rotor and its operating characteristic
The Brushless Direct Current (BLDC) motor is rapidly resembles those of a DC motor. Motor operation is based
popularity by its utilization in various industries, such as on the attraction or repulsion between magnetic poles.
Appliances, Automotive, Aerospace, Consumer, Medical, Using the three-phase motor shown in Figure.2, the process
Military Equipment, and Industrial Automation Equipment. starts when current flows through one of the three stator
They are used in robotics, computer disk drives, machine windings and generates a magnetic pole that attracts the
tools, electric vehicle and battery powered applications. As closest permanent magnet of the opposite pole. The rotor
the name, the BLDC motors do not use brushes for will move if the current shifts to an adjacent winding.
commutation; instead, they are electronically commutated. Sequentially charging each winding will cause the rotor to
The BLDC motors have many advantages over brushed DC follow in a rotating field. The torque depends on the current
motors and induction motors. A few of these are: amplitude and the number of turns on the stator windings,
• Better speed versus torque response the strength and the size of the permanent magnets, the air
• High dynamic response gap between the rotor and the windings, and the length of
• High efficiency the rotating arm. The BLDC motor is driven by DC voltage
• Long operating life but current commutation is done by solid-state switches.
• Noiseless operation The commutation instants are determined by the rotor
• Higher speed ranges position and the rotor position is determined either by
• Less maintenance position sensors like Hall sensor, position encoder and
resolver or by sensorless techniques.
 60° so that current is in phase with the back EMF. Current
commutation is done by six-step inverter as shown in a
simplified form in figure.6. The switches are shown as
bipolar junction transistors but MOSFET switches are most
common. Table1 shows the switching sequence, the current
direction and the position sensor signals.

Fig. 2 Motor Rotation

IV. SENSOR of ROTOR POSITION

The position sensors are used for BLDC motors, for Fig. 4 BLDC cross-section and phase energizing sequence.
rotor speed and position is controlled. Traditionally, the
sensors are used in BLDC motors which mounted on the
motor shaft or stator. Hall effect and optic sensors are the
most popular sensors. Sensorless control of BLDC motors
can’t achieve high speed and acceleration according to
sensor-based control of BLDC motors. This paper
represents a methodology for detecting position of a BLDC
motor using inexpensive analog Hall sensors, and a low
computation time algorithm to extract position information.

Fig. 5 Back EMF, phase current and rotor position.

Fig. 3 BLDC motor transverse section with hall sensors

A. Hall Effect Sensor for BLDC Motor Operation

Magnetic flux is provided by the rotor permanent

magnets for Hall Effect sensors. Hall voltage is a small
value. It’s 30 mV. Hall voltage is increased by the
amplifier. Hall effect sensors are mounted the intervals of
120° or 60° in BLDC motors. The three phase BLDC motor Fig. 6 Simplified BLDC drive scheme.
is operated in a two phase-ON fashion, i.e. the two phases
that produce the highest torque are energized while third TABLE I
phase is off. Which two phases are energized depend on SWITCHING SEQUENCE
rotor position. The signals from the position sensors Switching Pos. Sensors Phase current
produce a three digit number that changes every 60° Sequence Switch
Interval
Number H1 H2 H3 Closed A B C
(electrical degrees) as shown in figure.5 (H1, H2, H3). The In Degree
figure also shows ideal current and back EMF waveforms. 0-60 0 1 0 0 Q1,Q4 + - Off
Of
Figure.4 shows cross sectional view of three phase star 60-120 1 1 1 0 Q1,Q6 +
f
-
connected BLDC motor along with its phase energizing 120-180 2 0 1 0 Q3,Q6 Off + -
sequence. Each interval starts with the rotor and stator 180-240 3 0 1 1 Q3,Q2 - + Off
fields’ line 120° apart and ends when they are 60° apart. 240-300 4 0 0 1 Q5,Q2 -
Of
+
Maximum torque is reached when the field lines are f
300-360 5 1 0 1 Q5,Q4 Off - +
perpendicular. The commutation phase sequence is like
AB-AC-BC BA-CA-CB. Each conducting stage is called
one step. Therefore, only two phases conduct current at any
time, leaving the third phase floating. In order to produce
maximum torque, the inverter should be commutated every
 B. Method of PID Tuning

The tuning of PID controller involves designing the

controller constants ( K p , T i and T d ¿ de-pending on the
performance requirements. There are various methods
available in literature to design these values. The Ziegler-
Nichols rules use for determining the controller constants.
These rules have been developed from experiments and by
analyzing various industrial processes.
Fig. 7 BLDC motor drive system

VI. BLDC MOTOR MATHEMATICAL MODEL

V. CONTROLLER

BLDC motors have a very wide range of speed, so During two-phase conduction, the entire dc voltage is
speed control is a very important issue for it. Speed control applied to the two-phases having an impedance of:
d dL
is the process of changing the electric power delivered to
the motor to achieve a certain speed which is needed.
Another purpose of speed control is to keep the motor
[
Z=2 Rs + ]
( L −M 1 ) = R+ dt
dt 1
(2)

where
speed constant with outsource disturbances in torque. For R s: stator resistance per phase.
speed and position control, a three-phase inverter with
power transistors and free-wheeling diodes, the L1: self inductance per phase.
conditioning circuitry for motor phase voltages, and the M 1: mutual inductance per phase.
processing hardware for PWM control requires and PID
tuning method requires to be good overshoot, fast response
R=2 R s and L=2( L1−M 1 )
and stability.
(3)

A. PID Controller The stator voltage equation is given by:

V¿ Zi+e a−ec (4)
The proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controller is
well documented in the literature since the classic Ziegler-
Nichols method was presented. This is because PID dL
V¿( R+ )i+e a−ec
controller is simple, robust and well understood. A PID dt
controller attempts to correct the error between a measured (5)
process variable and a desired set point by calculating and
then outputting a corrective action that can adjust the e a=−ec =φ p ωm (6)
process accordingly. So by integrating the PID controller to
the BLDC motor we will be able to correct the error made
by the BLDC motor and control the position of the motor to
the desired speed or point.
The steps to be followed to design a PID Controller
V¿
( R + dLdt )i +2 φ ω p m (7)

are,
• Add a proportional constant to eliminate the rise time.
• Add a derivative control to eliminate the over-shoot.
V¿
( R + dLdt )i + K ω
b m (8)

• Add an integral control to eliminate the steady state

error.
V(s)¿ ( R+ Ls ) I (s )+ K b ωm (s) (9)
• Adjust each of K p , K d , K i until the design
requirements are met.
The PID controller depending on the error changes its 1
I ( s ) =[V ( s )−K b ω m ( s ) ]
output, to control the plant input such that the error is ( R + Ls )
minimized. The Transfer function of a PID controller is (10)
given as, The electromagnetic torque for two-phases is given by:
1 T m=2 φ p i=K b i(11)
C (s)=K P (1+ +T D∗s) (1)
T I ∗s
where, T m=K b I ( s ) (12)
K P= Proportional Gain constant
T I = Integral reset time T m=T l (T d=0)(13)
T D = Derivative time or rate time
 d ωm
T l=J + B ω m(14)
dt

T l=Js ω m (s)+ B ω m (s) ω m(15)

T l=ω m ( s ) [ Js + B ](16)

ωm ( s ) 1
= (17)
Tl ( Js+B ) Fig.10 SIMULINK result of position control in degree-time curve

dθ
ω m= (18)
dt

ω m (s )=¿ s θ( s) (19)

θ( s) 1
= (20)
ωm (s) s

Fig.8 Block diagram of BLDC motor transfer function

A. Simulation Model

Fig. 11 Flow chart of the system

VII. CONCLUSION

This paper presents the position tracking of a gun turret

system with its BLDC motor and to control the rotational
angle of the gun turret to achieve high precision in hitting
the target. The position tracking of the BLDC motor was
carried out within MATLAB/SIMULINK software. PID
controller based Ziegler-Nichols method was evaluated in
tracking the accurate angle.
Fig.9 SIMULINK model with some parameters
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
For PID tuning (Ziegler-Nichols method),
The author is specially thankful to Lieutenant Colonel
Proportional (P) =15
Min Zaw Thein, Head of Department of Electrical Power
Integral (I) =0.001
Engineering, Defence Services Technological Academy,
Derivative (D) =-0.1
for giving the permission to submit this paper and his
Filter coefficient (N) =100
supervisor, Captain Zaw Myint Aung, Asistant lecturer,
Electrical Power Engineering Department, Defence
Services Technological Academy, for his supervision,
patient guidance, kindly permission and suggestions.

REFERENCES
[1] Chandra Shekhar Gohiya, S.S.Sadistap, S.A.Akbar, B.A.Botre
Central ,” Design and Development of Digital PID Controller for
DC Motor Drive System Using Embedded Platform for Mobile
Robot”, 978-1-4673-4529-3/12/$31.00 c 2012 IEEE, 2013 3rd IEEE
International Advance Computing Conference (IACC).
[2] J. G. Ziegler and N. B. Nichols: Optimum Settings for Automatic
Controllers, Trans. ASME, Vol. 64, 1942, s. 759-768
[3] R. Krishnan, “Permanent Magnet Synchronous and Brushless DC
Motor Drives: Theory, Operation, Performance, Modeling,
Simulation, Analysis and Design, Part 3: Permanent Magnet
Brushless DC Machines and Their Control,” Virginia Tech,
Blacksburg, 2000.
[4] William Palm III, Modeling, Analysis and Control of Dynamic
Systems, 2nd edition, John Wiley and Sons.

APPENDIX

Specification for KY80AS202-15

Rated voltage DC24V

Rated power 200w
Rated speed 1500rpm
Rated torque 1.27N.m
Rated current 9.4A
Line resistance 0.06Ω
Rotor inductance 0.28mH
Torque constant 0.17N.m/A
Back EMF constant 17.3V/Kr/min
Rotor inertia 418kg.m 2∗106
Mechanical time constant 0.56ms
Electrical time constant 0.5ms
Weight 2.2kg