Thesis deals with design of construction, control and electronics for unstable balancing vehicle. The rst part is focused on the determination of requirements for the function and then design and manufacture of structure in line with set requirements, including 3D models and drawings. The second part is devoted to the creation of simulation models of vehicles using the Lagrange equations of the second kind and using SimMechanics. Also PID and LQR regulators are designed, including the advantages and disadvantages of each regulator for this application. The last part is focused on electronics necessary to vehicle operating. They are mainly power electronics (H-bridge, battery charger, switching supply of voltage board). There are also necessary calculations, complete PCB design and a description of the rmware for the this specifc device.

Cascaded H-bridge (CHB) multilevel inverters have significant popularity with motor drives applications due to their modularity, scalability, and reliability. Typical CHB inverters employ diode rectifiers that allow unidirectional power flow from the grid to the load. To capture and utilize the regenerated energy in regenerative applications, regenerative CHB drives were introduced with two-level voltage source converters in the front end to allow bidirectional energy flow. This solution is accompanied by challenges of high number of switches and control circuits, high switching power losses, and massive dimensions. Recently, developing more economic versions of regenerative cascaded H-bridge drives has become one of the hottest topics in power electronics research. In this thesis work, two solutions are proposed for more energy efficient and economic regenerative CHB drives. The first solution is a proposed power cell configuration that reduces the number of switches per cell by two. Additionally, phase alternation connection method and carrier phase-shifting techniques are introduced to address the challenges of the presented configuration. The switch-count reduction reduces the system’s complexity, switches’ cost, and footprint. The second proposed solution is a new controller to operate the front-end converters as fundamental frequency ends (FFEs). The proposed controller is employed in both the conventional regenerative cascaded H-bridge and the proposed reduced switch-count configuration. This solution minimizes the switching power losses, and results in more compact and economic design, with higher DC-link utilization. Theoretical analysis and simulation studies of both proposed solutions show promising performance and capability to be applied as energy-efficient and cost effective regenerative CHB motor drives. Experimental validation of the proposed reduced switch-count configuration is presented for STATCOM operation of a scaled-down 7-Level regenerative CHB drive system. The future work of this thesis includes experimental validation of the proposed FFE controller, and operation of the system with regenerative motor load. / Thesis / Master of Applied Science (MASc)

High power converters are widely used in many industries. At power levels in the range of Mega Watt (MW), power conversion at medium voltage (MV) is preferred due to better efficiency and lower cost. For medium voltages applications, multilevel converters are widely adopted due to the features they offer with respect to two-level converters. Cascaded H-bridge topology is a widely adopted multilevel topology because of its modularity, scalability, and reliability. The conventional cascaded H-bridge topology allows two-quadrant operation. In order to allow fourquadrant operation, an active front end version of the cascaded H-bridge topology has been proposed in literature and recently commercialized. In the field, power converters operates under harsh loading and environmental conditions. The resulting stresses imposed on converter components cause their gradual degradation. In cascaded H-bridge converters, typically power cell components such as power modules, DC-bus capacitors, and control PCBs are v highly stressed. Under these stresses power cell components degrade and require replacement in the field, otherwise unexpected failures may occur. The thesis aim is to address power cell components reliability through proposing novel regenerative cascaded H-bridge converter control schemes to reduce components stresses and failure probability without increasing size, cost, or complexity. First, a novel PWM active front end control scheme has been proposed to reduce the inherent ripple current stresses on the DC-bus capacitors. Second, the thesis proposes a novel grid or near grid switching frequency front end control scheme to reduce stresses on power modules and the power cell cooling requirements. Third, novel cascaded H-bridge front end control schemes are proposed to reduce the sensor count, thereby decreasing failure rate and cutting down cost. The proposed work has been thoroughly validated through detailed 9- cell regenerative cascaded H-bridge system simulation and experimentation. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Conventional 2-level inverters have been quite popular in industry for drives applications. It used pulse width modulation techniques to generate a voltage waveform with high quality. For achieving this, it had to switch at high frequencies and also the switching is between 0 and Vdc. Also additional LC filters are required before feeding to a motor. 3-phase IM is the work horse of the industry. Several speed control techniques have been established namely the V/f control technique and for high performance, vector control is adopted. An electric drive system comprises of a rectifier, inverter, a motor and a load. each module is a topic by itself. This thesis work discusses the novel inverter topologies to overcome the demerits of a conventional 2-level inverter or even the basic multilevel topologies, for an electric drive. The word ‘multilevel’ itself signifies that inverter can generate more than two levels. The idea was first originated by Nabae, Takahashi and Akagi to bring an additional voltage level so that the waveform becomes a quasi square wave. This additional voltage level brought additional benefits in terms of reduced dv/dt and requirement of low switching frequency. But this was not without any cost. The inverter structure is slightly more complicated than a 2-level and also required more devices. But the advantage it gave was superior enough to such an extent that the above topology (popularly known as NPC) has become quite popular in industry. This topology was later modified to equalize the semiconductor losses among switches by replacing the clamping diodes with controllable switches and such topologies are popularly known as Active NPCs (ANPCs) because of the replacement of diodes with active switches. 3-level flying capacitors were then introduced where the additional voltage level is provided using charged capacitors. But this capacitor voltage has to be maintained at its nominal value during the inverter operation. An additional floating capacitor, which is an electrolytic capacitor is needed for this. Increasing the number of electrolytic capacitors reduces the reliability of the inverter drive since they are the weakest link in any inverters and its count has to be kept to the minimum. By using a H-bridge cell in each of the three phases, three voltage levels can be easily obtained.This is commonly known as Cascaded H-bridge (CHB) multilevel inverter. The above three topologies have been discussed with respect to generation of three pole voltage levels and these topologies are quite suited also. A higher number of voltage levels will reduce the switching frequency even lesser and also the dv/dt. On increasing the number of levels further and further, finally the inverter need not do any PWM switching and just generating the levels is sufficient enough for a good quality waveform and also low dv/dt. But when the above topologies are scaled for more than three voltage levels, all of them suffer serious drawbacks which is briefly discussed below. The diode clamped inverter (known as NPC if it is 3-level), when extended to more than three levels suffers from the neutral point balancing issue and also the count of clamping diodes increase drastically. FC inverters, when extended beyond 3-level, the number of electrolytic capacitors increases and also balancing of these capacitors to their nominal voltages becomes complicated. In the case of multilevel CHB, when extended beyond 3-level, the requirement of isolated DC sources also increases. To generate isolated supplies, phase shifting transformer and 8, 12 or 24 pulse diode rectifier is needed which increases the weight , size and cost of the drive. Therefore its application is limited. In this thesis, the aim is to develop a novel method to develop a multilevel inverter without the drawbacks faced by the basic multilevel topologies when scaled for higher number of voltage levels. This is done through stacking the basic or hybrid combination of these basic multilevel topologies through selector switches. This method is experimentally verified by stacking two 5-level inverters through a 2-level selector switch (whose switching losses can be minimized through soft cycle commutation). This will generate nine levels.Generating 9-levels through scaling the basic topologies is disadvantageous, the comparison table is provided in the thesis. This is true for any higher voltage level generation. Each of the above 5-level inverter is developed through cascading an FC with a capacitor fed H-bridge. The device count can be reduced by making the FC-CHB module common to the selector switches by shifting the selector switches between the DC link and the common FC-CHB module. Doing so, reduces the modular feature of the drive but the device count can be reduced. The FFT plot at different frequencies of operation and the switching losses of the different modules-FC, CHB and the selector switches are also plotted for different frequencies of operation. The next step is to check whether this method can be extended to any number of stackings for generation of more voltage levels. For this, a 49-level inverter is developed in laboratory by stacking three 17-level inverters. Each of the 17-level inverter is developed by cascading an FC with three CHBs. When there are 49 levels in the pole voltage waveform, there is no need to do any regular PWM since the output waveform will be very close to a sine wave even without any PWM switching. The technique used is commonly known in literature as Nearest Level Control (NLC). This method of stacking and cascading has the advantage that the FC and the CHB modules now are of very low voltages and the switching losses can be reduced. The switching losses of the different modules are calculated and plotted for different operating frequencies in the thesis. To reduce the voltages of the modules further, a 6-phase machine has been reconfigured as a 3-phase machine, the advantage being that now the DC link voltage requirement is half of that needed earlier for the same power. This further reduces voltages of the modules by half and this allows the switches to be replaced with MOSFETs, improving the efficiency of the drive. This topology is also experimentally verified for both steady state and transient conditions. So far the research focussed on a 3-phase IM fed through a stacked MLI. It can be observed that a stacked MLI needs as many DC sources as the number of stackings. A 6-phase machine apart from reduced DC link voltage requirement, has other advantages of better fault tolerant capability and better space harmonics. They are serious contenders for applications like ship propulsion, locomotive traction, electric vehicles, more electric aircraft and other high power industrial applications. Using the unique property of a 6-phase machine that its opposite windings always draw equal and opposite current, the neutral point (NP) (formed as a result of stacking two MLIs) voltage can be balanced. It was observed that the net mid point current drawn from the mid point can be made zero in a switching interval. It was later observed that with minimal changes, the mid point current drawn from the NP can be made instantaneously zero and the NP voltage deviation is completely arrested and the topology needs only very low capacity series connected capacitors energized from a single DC link. This topology is also experimentally verified using the stacked 9-level inverter topology discussed above but now for 6-phase application and experimental results are provided in the thesis. Single DC link enables direct back to back conversion and power can be fed back to the mains at any desired power factor. All the experimental verification is done on a DSP (TMS320F28335) and FPGA (Spartan 3 XCS3200) platform. An IM is run using V/f control scheme and the above inverter topologies are used to drive the motor. The IGBTs used are SKM75GB123D for the stacked 9-level inverter in the 3-phase and 6-phase experiments. For the 49-level inverter experiment, MOSFETs-IRF260N were used. Both steady state and transient results ensure that the proposed inverter topologies are suitable for high power applications.

This rapport deals with the construction of a self-balancing scooter. A self-balancing scooter is a two-wheel vehicle where the velocity is controlled by the tilt of the driver. When the driver leans forward and backward, the vehicle is running forward and backwards. The main task was to determine if the Arduino microcontroller could be used for the control system. An iron frame, control circuit and a tilt able handlebar were constructed. Two recycled permobil DC-motor were mounted onto the iron frame. An accelerometer and a gyrometer were obtaining the tilt of the handlebar and the scooter. The system was using locked Anti-phase drive and a PI-regulator to control the motors. The self-balancing scooter prototype worked well and was able to balance without any external help. The driver was able to control the speed by tilting forward or backward and was able to choose the direction by the tilt of the handlebar. The balance was affected negative by the backlashes from the gear and too weak H-bridges. If the project were made again, two three-phase hub motors with higher ratings would replace the DC-motors. Gears could be excluded and the backlashes are removed.

Renewable energy is harnessed from continuously replenishing natural processes. Some commonly known are sunlight, water, wind, tides, geothermal heat and various forms of biomass. The focus on renewable energy has over the past few decades intensified greatly. This thesis contributes to the research on developing renewable energy technologies, within the wind power, wave power and marine current power projects at the division of Electricity, Uppsala University. In this thesis grid connection of permanent magnet generator based renewable energy sources is evaluated. A tap transformer based grid connection system has been constructed and experimentally evaluated for a vertical axis wind turbine. Full range variable speed operation of the turbine is enabled by using the different step-up ratios of a tap transformer. This removes the need for a DC/DC step or an active rectifier on the generator side of the full frequency converter and thereby reduces system complexity. Experiments and simulations of the system for variable speed operation are done and efficiency and harmonic content are evaluated.  The work presented in the thesis has also contributed to the design, construction and evaluation of a full-scale offshore marine substation for wave power intended to grid connect a farm of wave energy converters. The function of the marine substation has been experimentally tested and the substation is ready for deployment. Results from the system verification are presented. Special focus is on the transformer losses and transformer in-rush currents. A control and grid connection system for a vertical axis marine current energy converter has been designed and constructed. The grid connection is done with a back-to-back 2L-3L system with a three level cascaded H-bridge converter grid side. The system has been tested in the laboratory and is ready to be installed at the experimental site. Results from the laboratory testing of the system are presented. / Wind Power / Wave Power / Marine Currnet Power

It is customary to obtain ac power from batteries through a power converter, where mains ac power is not readily available. Such a power converter is also needed in several mobile/ airborne/ space applications. Till recently this application is served by a H bridge inverter followed by a low frequency transformer and a passive low pass filter. The H bridge inverter employs high frequency pulse width modulation. The transformer is made of standard silicon steel. The filter is made of L and C elements. In such a converter the magnetics account for about 30% of cost and 50% of weight. Moreover the dc input current in such converters is discontinuous, leading to poor efficiency. There is need for an input filter as well. This thesis presents the development of an inverter with high frequency (hf) link. The power converter employs a boost front end resulting in continuous input current. The H bridge inverter employs phase modulation technique with soft switching features. The boost converter and the H bridge share power devices. The isolation transformer handles high frequency ac power and is compact. It is shown that the transformer size can be reduced by more than one order of magnitude. There is a rear end cycloconverter to reconvert the high frequency ac power into 50 Hz output power. Innovative pulse sequencing in the cycloconverter ensures loss-less switching. The pulse width modulation shifts the dominant harmonic frequency to double the switching frequency. The output LC filter is light. The converter can handle bidirectional power. The controller is digital. The overall concept was demonstrated through the 500 W prototype design. The proposed topology offers small size, low losses and continous input current. The controller is digital and offers totally software based compensation and settings. It is expected that on account of the small size and cost, this topology is likely to become more popular in the near future. The applications of such power converters will bring down the size and cost of UPS, solar inverters, wind mill inverters etc.

Wave power is a renewable energy source with great potential, which is why there are more than a hundred ongoing wave power projects around the world. At the Division of Electricity, Uppsala University, a point-absorber type wave energy converter (WEC) has been proposed and developed. The WEC consists of a linear synchronous generator placed on the seabed, connected to a buoy floating on the surface. Power is absorbed by heave motion of the buoy, and converted into electric energy by the generator. The point-absorber WEC must be physically much smaller than the wavelength of the incoming waves, and can therefore not be scaled to very high power levels. Instead, the total power output is boosted by increasing the number of WECs, connecting them in wave power farms. To transfer the electric energy to the grid, an intermediate marine substation is proposed, where an AC/DC/AC conversion step is performed. Within this PhD-work, a full-scale offshore marine substation has been designed, constructed and experimentally evaluated. The substation is rated for grid-connection of seven WECs to the local 1kV-grid, and is placed on the seabed 3km off the coast at a depth of 25m. Various aspects of the substation design have been considered, including the mechanical and electrical systems, the WEC electrical interface, offshore operations and the automatic grid connection control system. A tap change circuit and different multilevel topologies have also been proposed. This dissertation has an experimental approach, validating a major part of the work with lab results. The final substation electrical circuit has been tested at rated grid voltage with a fluctuating input power source. The efficiency has been measured and the implemented functions are verified. Offshore operations have been successfully carried out and offshore wave farm data is expected in the nearby future.

Submitted by JORGE ESTEBAN BLANCO RODRIGUEZ null (lobogris87@msn.com) on 2016-06-01T14:53:04Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Jorge Esteban Blanco Rodriguez.pdf: 3365866 bytes, checksum: edf247c26e3f44cc20ef44607e947f0e (MD5) / Rejected by Ana Paula Grisoto (grisotoana@reitoria.unesp.br), reason: Solicitamos que realize uma nova submissão seguindo as orientações abaixo: O mês informado na capa do documento está diferente da data de defesa que consta na folha de aprovação. Corrija esta informação no arquivo PDF e realize uma nova submissão contendo o arquivo correto. Agradecemos a compreensão. on 2016-06-02T13:45:11Z (GMT) / Submitted by JORGE ESTEBAN BLANCO RODRIGUEZ null (lobogris87@msn.com) on 2016-06-02T14:37:35Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Jorge Esteban Blanco Rodriguez 30-03-2016.pdf: 2668564 bytes, checksum: 75234917c13bea3285297fb6aeb7f0ec (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Ana Paula Grisoto (grisotoana@reitoria.unesp.br) on 2016-06-02T16:43:57Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 blancorodriguez_je_me_ilha.pdf: 2668564 bytes, checksum: 75234917c13bea3285297fb6aeb7f0ec (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-06-02T16:43:57Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 blancorodriguez_je_me_ilha.pdf: 2668564 bytes, checksum: 75234917c13bea3285297fb6aeb7f0ec (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-03-30 / Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) / Implementou-se um estimulador elétrico funcional para uso na reabilitação de pacientes hígidos e paraplégicos e que não necessita de alimentação simétrica. O equipamento é constituído por dois estágios, o formador de onda, no qual se define os parâmetros do sinal de estimulação, e o de potência. No formador de onda foi utilizado uma placa Raspberry pi e uma interface de usuário, desenvolvida em Python. O estágio de potência é composto por um espelho de corrente que possibilita a utilização de transistores não casados, e uma estrutura em ponte H, para formar o sinal de eletroestimulação bifásico, sem a necessidade de fonte simétrica, diminuindo assim pela metade a diferença de potencial aplicada na alimentação do circuito. Com o estimulador implementado gerou-se correntes com forma de onda retangular, amplitude de até 120 mA e características adequadas para utilização na reabilitação dos membros inferiores e superiores de pacientes. / A functional electrical stimulator for use in the rehabilitation of paraplegic and healthy patients was implemented. It does not need symmetrical power supply. The equipment consists of two stages, the wave generator, which defines the stimulation signal parameters, and the power stage. In the wave generator we have used a Raspberry Pi board and a user interface, developed in Python. In the power stage we have used a current mirror which enables the use of unmarried transistors and a H-bridge circuit to generate a biphasic signal. With the implemented stimulator, currents with rectangular waveform, range of up to 120 mA, and suitable characteristics for using in rehabilitation of the lower and upper limbs of patients were generated.

Orientador: Aparecido Augusto de Carvalho / Resumo: Implementou-se um estimulador elétrico funcional para uso na reabilitação de pacientes hígidos e paraplégicos e que não necessita de alimentação simétrica. O equipamento é constituído por dois estágios, o formador de onda, no qual se define os parâmetros do sinal de estimulação, e o de potência. No formador de onda foi utilizado uma placa Raspberry pi e uma interface de usuário, desenvolvida em Python. O estágio de potência é composto por um espelho de corrente que possibilita a utilização de transistores não casados, e uma estrutura em ponte H, para formar o sinal de eletroestimulação bifásico, sem a necessidade de fonte simétrica, diminuindo assim pela metade a diferença de potencial aplicada na alimentação do circuito. Com o estimulador implementado gerou-se correntes com forma de onda retangular, amplitude de até 120 mA e características adequadas para utilização na reabilitação dos membros inferiores e superiores de pacientes. / Abstract: A functional electrical stimulator for use in the rehabilitation of paraplegic and healthy patients was implemented. It does not need symmetrical power supply. The equipment consists of two stages, the wave generator, which defines the stimulation signal parameters, and the power stage. In the wave generator we have used a Raspberry Pi board and a user interface, developed in Python. In the power stage we have used a current mirror which enables the use of unmarried transistors and a H-bridge circuit to generate a biphasic signal. With the implemented stimulator, currents with rectangular waveform, range of up to 120 mA, and suitable characteristics for using in rehabilitation of the lower and upper limbs of patients were generated. / Mestre