Defence Science Journal, Vol. 54, No. 3, July 2004, pp.

379-385
© 2004, DESIDOC

SHORT COMMUNICATION

Alternating Current All-electrical Gun Control System in Tanks

Zang Kemao, Ma Xiaojun, and Li Changbing

Academy of Armored Forces Engineering, Beijing-100 072

ABSTRACT

The ac all-electrical gun control system is composed of permanent magnetic synchronous

machine-drive control systems and the ball-screw by replacing the complicated electrohydraulic
systems. At the same time, the variable-structure system with sliding modes makes the gun
control systems to have higher performances using the only rate flexure gyroscope. Thereby,
vehicle hull gyroscope and angular gyroscope are left out.The new ac all-electrical gun control
systems developed are reduced by 40 per cent in weight, decreased by 30 per cent in volume,
increased by 35 per cent in efficiency, and enhanced by three times in service life as compared
to the current gun control systems.

Keywords: PMSM-drive control system, gun control system, screw drive, flexure gyroscope, permanent
magnetic synchronous machine-drive control system, ac motor speed control technology

1. INTRODUCTION In 1990s, France's Leclerc main battle tank

The traverse subsystem of most tank gun control adopted dc all-electrical gun control system controlled
systems is composed of electrical drive control by the pulse width modulation (PWM) which had
system, and the elevation subsystem is composed smaller volume, lighter weight, and higher efficiency,
of electrohydraulic system.The hydraulic system but had the disadvantage of serious electromagnetic
has many disadvantages, such as leaking oil, firing disturbance because of still having brush and commutator,
easily, happening second effect, maintenance which often affect the normal operation of
complication, higher cost, shorter service life, etc. communication system from within and outside of
So every country in the world is trying to improve the tank.
the elevation subsystem to apply electrical drive Nowadays, the ac motor speed control technology
control system, thereby, it becomes all-electrical has become mature, and the present study applies
gun control system. In 1970s, UK adopted all- the latest ac motor speed control technology to
electrical gun control system.whose traverse and study ac all-electrical gun control system in tanks.
elevation subsystems were all amplidyne-motor systems,
on Chieftan main battle tank. The system is dc all- 2. MAIN COMPONENTS OF TANK GUN
electrical gun control system which overcomes many CONTROL SYSTEM
disadvantages of the hydraulic system,but still has
some disadvantages, such as large volume, heavy Since the tank gun control system needs to
weight, low efficiency, and having brush and commutator. operate on the three states of aiming, stabilisation,
Revised 29 April 2004
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 DBF SCI J, VOL. 54, NO. 3, JULY 2004

and servo in the battlefield, its traverse and elevation PH = (/„ + Gr sinl5°) x 10/57.3
subsystems are composed of electrical-drive control
system, gyroscope, regulators, and mechanical drive set. = (1500 + 9000 x 9.81 x 0.4 x sin!5°)x 10/57.3
= 1856.8 W. (2)
2.1 Traverse Subsystem
Finally, the power selected was 2 kW.
2.1.1 Electrical-drive Control System
The motor of the traverse subsystem, which
(a) Motor
is decelerated with mechanical-drive set, drives
Because permanent magnetic synchronous tank turret to rotate, thereby, gun rotates traversely.The
machine(PMSM) possesses many advantages, such deceleration ratio of mechanical-drive set is
as brushless, smaller volume, lighter weight, and i = 400, then the rotating speed of motor is n when
higher efficiency, which meet the development needs the traverse speed of turret/gun is 30 °/s:
of the tank gun control technology. It is adopted
in the electrical-drive control system,whose permanent "max = 30 X 60 X I / 360

magnetic material is samarium-cobalt alloy. PMSM = 30 60 x 400 / 360

x
adopts hollow structure /to redude the moment of
inertia and to speed up the response of the system. = 2000 r/min (3)
Let one has the following assumptions to compute When the traverse speed of turret/gun is 0.024 °/s:
the power of the motor required:
n min = 0.024 x 60 x i / 360
Turret weight (G) = 9000 kg
= 0.024 x 60 x 400 / 360
2
Moment of inertia (J) = 2500 N x m
= 1.6 r/min (4)
Total moment of friction (fT) < 1500 N x m
It is obvious that the power of the motor is
Distance between gravitational centre and rotation 2kW and the rotation speed is 1.6 ~ 2000 r/min.
axis of turret (r) = 0.4 m
(b) Control Modes
Tactics technology demands the maximum rotating
speed of traverse subsystem (vmax) = 30 °/s Permanent magnetic synchronous machine
(PMSM) adopts sine pulse width modulation (SPWM)
Minimum rotation speed of traverse subsystem control, which is implemented by SLE 4520 chip.
(vmin) = 0.024 '/s SLE 4520 chip is a three-phase PWM programmable
integrated circuit which can transform 8-bit digital
Maximum acceleration (amax) = 0.5 rad/s2. quantity to three PWM signals to form three-phase
SPWM wave cooperated with computer, so as to
The power of the motor required is computed
drive a three-phase converter. It has been shown
based on the maximum acceleration as
in Fig. 1 that SLE 4520 chip cooperates with 8031
^ = ( / r + / « m a x ) x v m a x 757.3 computer, forms SPWM wave to drive IGBT converter.

= ( 1500 + 2500 x 0.5) x 30 / 57.3 The output voltage ((/) of the electrical drive
control system changes linearly with frequency(/)
= 1439.7 W (1) namely:
Now the gun was moved at rotating speed of
10 °/s to compute the power of the motor required U
~7 = Constant (5)
based on tank listing 15°:

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 KEMAO, et al.\ ALTERNATING CURRENT ALL-ELECTRICAL GUN CONTROL SYSTEM IN TANKS

PH3/2
PH2/2
PHI/2
PH3/1
PH2/1
PHI/1

XTAL1

XTAL2

UDD +5V

SET STATUS
SLE4520

Figure 1. Sine pulse width modulation control implemented by SLE 4520 chip

The control clock frquency(/"fCT) is computed landform so as to affect gun aiming at the target.
as follows when the frequency(/) modulation range To keep gun aiming automatically at the target,
is 0.5-60 Hz: and make gun not to vibrate with the vibration of
the hull, gyroscope is often set on the gun body.
/„_= 3360 x /= 1.68 ~ 201.6 Hz (6) When the gun departures the aiming target due to
The pulse modulation width is determined as some reasons, gyroscope immediately sends a signal
follows: amplified by power amplifier, that is further passed
on to electrical-drive system which makes the gun
T, r, M . . j
tpu = -~ 11 + y (sin(:«i + sin M2 ) I (7)
move to the original position until it restores the
original aiming angle. This is usually called stabilisation
state.
where (0 is the 2n f, t u is the pulse width, Tt is
the period of trigonometric function, M is the amplitude The flexure gyroscope, which has more stable
modulation ratio, and tr t2 are the time of intersection position of gravitational centre (because its rotor
points between sine wave and triangle wave. is suspended on the axis), is a kind of speed gyroscope
developed recently. Simultaneously, the supporting
2.1.2 Flexure Gyroscope
friction, only depending on inner friction of flexible
During marching forward, the vehicle hull, including material, is smaller. The flexure gyroscope is a
gun of the tank vibrates with the undulation of kind of higher performance and lower cost gyroscope

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 DEF SCI J, VOL. 54, NO. 3, JULY 2004

which substitutes flexure support for traditional signal; the electrical signal, reflecting the angular
support to bring a series of advantages and is used speed, becomes the angle signal by integral function
widely in inertia navigation. After a detailed discussion, of PID regulator. So the speed gyroscope and the
the speed flexure gyroscope was used in the studies. speed regulator constitute the position loop.

Based on the demand of technology index, Based on the the traverse subsystem operating
the performance data of the flexure gyroscope on aiming state or stabilisation state, logic judgement
should be: and switch element make the traverse subsystem
to become two-loop system composed of current
Minimum speed sensitivity < 0.02 °/s
and speed loop when operating on aiming state, or
Maximum speed sensitivity < 30 °/s that composed of current and position loop when
operating on stabilisation state. The former is speed
2.1.3 Composition of Traverse Subsystem control system which can gain wide speed control
range to meet the demand of aiming; the latter is
The traverse subsystem block diagram is shown position control system, namely servo system, which
in Fig. 2. It is made up of the electrical drive has very high response speed. Consequently, traverse
control system, gyroscope, and mechanical drive subsystem possesses high stable precision.
set and regulator. '
2.2 Elevation Subsystem
The speed regulator is proportion integral differential
(PID) regulator and the current regulator is proportion The characteristic of an elevation subsystem
integral (PI) regulator in the block diagram. The is that the rotation of the motor of the electrical-
current feedback element and the current regulator drive control system should be transformed to beeline
form current loop. The speed measuring equipment, movement to drive the pitching of the gun. The
(which is the speed feedback element of the motor) present study adopts screw drive mode, mainly
and the speed regulator, make up for the speed using ball-screw and nuts to realise the transformation
loop. The speed gyroscope is used to measure the from the rotation of the motor to the pitching of
angular speed of turret/gun departure from the the gun. To reduce the conversion mechanism in
original position and to transform it to electrical length, the valid travel of ball-screw and nut is put

LOGICAL JUDGE
AND SWITCH

MECHANICAL
DRIVE SET

SPEED MEASURE - CURRENT FEEDBACK

EQUIPMENT OF
MOTOR

Figure 2 Traverse control subsystem block diagram

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 DBF SCI J; VOL. 54, NO, 3, JULY 2004

Table 1. Comparison of ac all-electrical gun control system with the original system

Max speed (deg/s) Min speed (deg/s) Stable precision (mil)

Traverse Elevation Traverse Elevation Traverse Elevation
ac all-electrical 1.0
33 8.8 0.021 0.018 0.6
gun control system
Original system 18 5.5 0.050 0.050 2.0 1.0

set (composed of amplidyne and its dc drive motor)and Alternating current all-electrical gun control
dc turret motor [Figs 5 (a) and 5(b)] system adopts flexure gyroscope to replace
Direct current 28 V on the tank is inverted into 3- frame gyroscope and accessorial rotary converter
phase ac 18 V to directly supply PMSM also to drive and tube amplifier. So,the parts of ac all-electical
the pitching of the gun by ball-screw in the elevation gun control system are reduced from 11 to 5,
subsystem of ac all-eletrical gun control system, which its weight reduced from 115 kg to 62 kg, its
replaces complicated electrohydraulic system composed volume is reduced from 53500 cm3 to 36500 cm3,
of dc oil-pump motor, hydraulic amplifier, oil tank, and its efficiency is increased from 50.5 per cent
power cylinder, etc. [Figs 6(a) and 6(b)] to 86 per cent.

dc 28 V, 3 kW
dc 28 V, 0.7 kW

V > r

dc OIL PUMP MOTOR

DRIVE
MOTOR HYDRAULIC AMPLIFIER

v
CONTROL t
dc To TURRET CONTROL W POWER CYLINDER TO GUN
UNIT — ) AMPLIDYNE 1 UK Kb 1 —r UNIT
J 35 kw
_H MOTOR 0.4 kW
OIL TANK
I \

dc 110 V, 1.7 kW

(a) (a)

dc 28 V, 2.4 kW
dc 28 V, 0.85 kW

Ul
CONTROL UNIT
ac 18 v
t TO
TURRET
'I 1
T T
- 1- ^fcp
INVERTER PMSM CONTROL UNIT
^^

^. dc TO GUN^
2 kW DRIVE MOTOR
INVERTER
^ 0.7 kW
t\

(b)
(b)
Figure 5. (a) Original traverse subsystem and (b) traverse Figure 6. (a) Original electrohydraulic system and
subsystem of all-electrical gun control (b) elevation subsystem of ac all-electrical gun
system. control system.

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 KEMAO, et at.: ALTERNATING CURRENT ALL-ELECTRICAL GUN CONTROL SYSTEM IN TANKS

REFERENCES 4. Mohan, U.R. Power electronics: converters,

applications, and design. New York, John Wiley
1. Gerard, Turbe. Eletrohydraulic systems in battle
& Sons Inc, 1995.
tanks. Inter. Def. Rev., 1985, 5, 1483-486.
5. Application guide for inverter (general-purpose
2. Nishiltata, S. Dynamic control of a self-controlled
inverter). In The Japan Electrical Manufacturers
synchronous motor drive system. IEEE Trans.
Association Report No. JEM-TR148, 1996.
Ind. Appl. (IA), 1994, 3, 2034.
pp. 181-85.
3. Jabbar, M. A. & Ralman, M. A. Permanent magnet
synchronous motor drives. Elect. Com. Engg.,
1997, 2, 878-83.

Contributor
Mr Zang Kemao graduated from the Zhejiang University, China. Currently he is
Professor at the Academy of Armored Forces Engineering, China.His research and
teaching interests are in the areas of automatic control, electrical engineering
and electromagnetic fields. He has published about 82 research papers. He is a
member of the Defence Science and Technology Organisation, China.

Mr Ma Xiaojun completed his PhD from the Qinghua University, in 1998. Currently,
he is Professor at the Academy of Armored Forces-Engineering, China.

Mr Li Changbing obtained his MS from the Academy of Armored Forces Engineering,

China. Presently, he is doing his PhD from the Beijing Institute of Technology,
China.

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