abstract: As the world population continues to age, the demand for treatment and rehabilitation of long-term age-related ailments will rise. Healthcare technology must keep up with this demand, and existing solutions must become more readily available to the populace. Conditions such as impairment due to stroke currently take months or years of physical therapy to overcome, but rehabilitative exoskeletons can be used to greatly extend a physical therapist’s capabilities. In this thesis, a rehabilitative knee exoskeleton was designed which is significantly lighter, more portable and less costly to manufacture than existing designs. It accomplishes this performance by making use of high-powered and weight-optimized brushless DC (BLDC) electric motors designed for drones, open-source hardware and software solutions for robotic motion control, and rapid prototyping technologies such as 3D printing and laser cutting. The exoskeleton is made from a series of laser cut aluminum plates spaced apart with off-the-shelf standoffs. A drone motor with a torque of 1.32 Nm powers an 18.5:1 reduction two-stage belt drive, giving a maximum torque of 24.4 Nm at the output. The bearings for the belt drive are installed into 3D printed bearing mounts, which act as a snug intermediary between the bearing and the aluminum plate. The system is powered off a 24 volt, 1,500 MAh lithium battery, which can provide power for around an hour of walking activity. The exoskeleton is controlled with an ODrive motor controller connected to a Raspberry Pi. Hip angle data is provided by an IMU, and the knee angle is provided by an encoder on the output shaft. A compact Rotary Series Elastic Actuator (cRSEA) device is mounted on the output shaft as well, to accurately measure the output torque going to the wearer. A Proportional-Derivative (PD) controller with feedforward relates the input current with the output torque. The device was tested on a treadmill and found to have an average backdrive torque of 0.39 Nm, significantly lower than the current state of the art. A gravity compensation controller and impedance controller were implemented to assist during swing and stance phases respectively. The results were compared to the muscular exertion of the knee measured via Electromyography (EMG). / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Engineering 2020

In order to meet higher performance demands on brushless motor controllers, motor feedback signals must meet correspondingly higher standards. Brushless motor controllers require angular feedback for motor commutation, and generally for one or more of the following: torque, velocity or position regulation. These feedback categories impose different requirements on the control system. In many brushless motor applications, sinusoidal encoders have significant advantages over square-wave encoders. Signal processing techniques for sinusoidal encoder feedback signals are considered in the context of a brushless motor positioning system. In particular, a method is presented for correcting gain and offset measurement errors based on ellipse-fitting techniques. / Master of Science

O objetivo deste trabalho é desenvolver a simulação de um sistema de controle de velocidade para compressores herméticos domésticos utilizando motores brushless DC controlados por uma estratégia do tipo sensorless. O ponto central é o desenvolvimento da simulação global de controle a partir de um modelo adequado do motor BLDC com base no programa Matlab/Simulink. São abordadas algumas estratégias de controle sensorless além de alguns métodos de partida para este tipo de máquina. As estratégias de controle e partida propostas para o trabalho são analisadas detalhadamente e simuladas através do Matlab em ambiente Simulink utilizando as ferramentas do power system blockset (PSB). Os resultados destas simulações são apresentados e discutidos no final deste trabalho. / The aim of this work is to develop the simulation of a speed control system for household hermetic compressors using brushless DC motors controlled by a sensorless strategy. The main point of the work is the development of the control global simulation from a suitable BLDC motor model based on Matlab/Simulink program. Some sensorless control strategies and even some starting methods for this type of machine are approached. The control and starting strategies proposed for this work are analyzed in detail and simulated by Matlab in Simulink program using power system blockset (PSB) tools. The simulation results are presented and discussed at the end of this work.

O objetivo deste trabalho é desenvolver a simulação de um sistema de controle de velocidade para compressores herméticos domésticos utilizando motores brushless DC controlados por uma estratégia do tipo sensorless. O ponto central é o desenvolvimento da simulação global de controle a partir de um modelo adequado do motor BLDC com base no programa Matlab/Simulink. São abordadas algumas estratégias de controle sensorless além de alguns métodos de partida para este tipo de máquina. As estratégias de controle e partida propostas para o trabalho são analisadas detalhadamente e simuladas através do Matlab em ambiente Simulink utilizando as ferramentas do power system blockset (PSB). Os resultados destas simulações são apresentados e discutidos no final deste trabalho. / The aim of this work is to develop the simulation of a speed control system for household hermetic compressors using brushless DC motors controlled by a sensorless strategy. The main point of the work is the development of the control global simulation from a suitable BLDC motor model based on Matlab/Simulink program. Some sensorless control strategies and even some starting methods for this type of machine are approached. The control and starting strategies proposed for this work are analyzed in detail and simulated by Matlab in Simulink program using power system blockset (PSB) tools. The simulation results are presented and discussed at the end of this work.

In this thesis axial flux and radial flux brushless dc motors will be studied as a drive motor for the control of moment gyroscope wheel. Design equations for axial flux and radial flux brushless dc motor topologies will be reviewed. Based on these equations radial and axial flux motors with different number of poles will be designed that meet control moment gyroscope wheel application requirements. The results will be evaluated in terms of efficiency, torque/mass and torque/volume, and suitability for the control moment gyroscope application.

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / This master thesis presents a sensorless speed control drive of Brushless DC motors used in reciprocating compressors. These compressors cause periodic load torque variations on the motor, consequently mechanical vibrations and acoustic noise are presented as well. As a result, a discrete speed controller based on the internal model principle is proposed. This controller aims to track the speed reference and to reduce the periodic torque disturbances caused by the compressor. The proposed controller consists of a rotor position and speed estimator, and a discrete speed controller with variable sampling frequency that depend on the rotor speed. The discrete estimator is based on the zero crossing point detection of the back-electromotive force. This method is optimized by using a Least Squares algorithm. The speed controller consists of two control actions, repetitive and proportional-derivative actions. In order to complement the drive system operation, a new procedure to start a BLDCM with current control is proposed. This technique ensures the maximization of the electromagnetic torque during startup and to avoid demagnetization of the permanent magnet by the stator current. Finally, simulation and experimental results are presented to demonstrate the performance of the techniques adopted, as well as the main advantages, disadvantages and operational limitations of the experimental implementation. In addition, the performance of the load torque rejection is evaluated by comparing the harmonic spectrum of the torques produced by the proposed speed controller and a PI controller. / Esta dissertação apresenta um sistema de acionamento e controle de velocidade sensorless para motores Brushless DC utilizados em compressores alternativos. Estes compressores provocam variações periódicas de carga sobre o motor causando vibrações mecânicas e ruído acústico. Em vista disso, um controlador discreto de velocidade baseado no princípio do modelo interno é proposto. Este controlador visa o rastreamento assintótico de uma velocidade de referência e a redução dos distúrbios cíclicos de conjugado provocados pelo compressor. Para isso, o sistema proposto é constituído por um estimador discreto da posição e da velocidade do rotor, e um controlador discreto de velocidade com frequência de amostragem variável em função da velocidade de rotação. O estimador discreto baseia-se na deteção do cruzamento da força contra-eletromotriz por zero, a qual é otimizada por meio de um algoritmo de Mínimos Quadrados. O controlador de velocidade é composto por duas ações de controle, uma ação repetitiva e uma proporcionalderivativa. De forma a complementar a operação do sistema de acionamento, um novo procedimento de partida com controle de corrente é proposto para o BLDCM. Este procedimento possibilita a maximização do conjugado eletromagnético do motor durante a partida e ainda evita a desmagnetização dos ímãs pela incidência de altas correntes estatóricas. Por fim, resultados de simulação e experimentais são apresentados para demonstrar o desempenho das técnicas adotadas, assim como as principais vantagens, desvantagens e limitações operacionais da implementação experimental. Além disso, a performance da rejeição parcial do conjugado de carga é avaliada com a comparação do espectro harmônico dos conjugados produzidos pelo controlador de velocidade proposto e por um controlador proporcional-integral.

This work was carried out on behalf of Science Safari. Science Safari wants to create a product that facilitates the understanding of how much physical work is required to create electrical energy. This is done by cranking the pedals of a bicycle. The purpose of this work is to create a control unit that keeps the torque required to crank the pedals close to constant. The torque can be kept constant by creating a variable load for the generator, in this case, a pulse modulated JFET is used. The output of the current sensor and the Hall-effect sensor are used to calculate the required resistance of the JFET to keep constant torque. All this is controlled via a Raspberry Pi 3 Model B (RPi) which also shows real-time values on a display. The functionality of the sensors and JFET has largely been completed, but the assembly of all components is lacking in this work. / Detta arbete är utfört i uppdrag av Science Safari. Science Safari vill skapa en produkt som underlättar förståelsen av hur mycket fysiskt arbete som krävs för att skapa elektrisk energi. Detta genom att användaren vevar på en cykels pedaler för hand. Syftet med detta arbete är att skapa en styrenhet som ungefär håller ett konstantvridmomentet på en cykels pedaler. Vridmomentet kan hållas konstant genom att skapa en variabel last till generatorn, med hjälp av en pulsmodulerad JFET. För att beräkna vilken resistans JFETen ska ha för att hålla konstant vridmoment används en strömsensor och en Hall-effect sensor. Allt detta styrs via en Raspberry Pi 3 ModelB som även visar värden i realtid på en display. Funktionaliteten av sensorerna och JFET har till stor del färdigställts men sammansättning av alla komponenter saknas i detta arbete.

published_or_final_version / Electrical and Electronic Engineering / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

<p>This report presents the work carried out aiming towardsdistributed control of electric drives through a networkcommunication medium with temporal constraints, i.e, Ethernet.A general analysis on time delayed systems is carried out,using state space representation of systems in the discretetime domain. The effect of input time delays is identified andis used in the preceding controller designs. The main hardwareapplication focused in this study is a Brushless DC servomotor, whose speed control loop is closed via a 10 MbpsSwitched Ethernet network. The speed control loop, which isapproximately a decade slower than the current control loop, isopened and interfaced to the network at the sensor/actuatornode. It is closed at the speed controller end at another nodein the same local area network (LAN) forming a distributedcontrol system (DCS).</p><p>The Proportional Integral (PI) classical controller designtechnique with ample changes in parameter tuning suitable fortime delayed systems is used. Then the standard Smith Predictoris tested, modified with the algebraic design techniqueCoefficient Diagram Method (CDM), which increases the systemdegrees of freedom. Constant control delay is assumed in thelatter designs despite the slight stochastic nature in thetiming data observations. Hence the poor transient performanceof the system is the price for the robustness inherited to thespeed controllers at the design stage. The controllability andobservability of the DCS may be lost, depending on the range inwhich the control delay is varying. However a state feedbackcontroller deploying on-line delay data, obtained by means ofsynchronizing the sensor node and controller node systemclocks, results in an effective compensation scheme for thenetwork induced delays. Hence the full state feedbackcontroller makes he distributed system transient performanceacceptable for servo applications with the help of poleplacement controller design.</p><p>Further, speed synchronizing controllers have been designedsuch that a speed fluctuation caused by a mechanical loadtorque disturbance on one motor is followed effectively by anyother specified motor in the distributed control network with aminimum tracking or synchronizing error. This type ofperformance is often demanded in many industrial applicationssuch as printing, paper, bagging, pick and place and materialcutting.</p><p><b>Keywords:</b>Brushless DC Motor, Control Delay, DistributedMotion Control Systems, Proportional Integral Controller, SmithPredictor, Speed Synchronization, State Feedback Controller,Stochastic Systems, Switched-Ethernet, Synchronizing Error,Time Delayed Systems, Tracking Error</p>

<p>This thesis describes how an algorithm is transferred from a digital signal processor to an embedded microprocessor in an FPGA using C to hardware program from Altera.</p><p>Saab Avitronics develops the secondary high lift control system for the Boeing 787 aircraft. The high lift system consists of electric motors controlling the trailing edge wing flaps and the leading edge wing slats. The high lift motors manage to control the Boeing 787 aircraft with full power even if half of each motor’s stators are damaged. The motor is a PMDC brushless motor which is controlled by an advanced algorithm. The algorithm needs to be calculated by a fast special digital signal processor.</p><p>In this thesis I have tested if the algorithm can be transferred to an FPGA and still manage the time and safety demands. This was done by transferring an already working algorithm from the digital signal processor to an FPGA. The idea was to put the algorithm in an embedded NIOS II microprocessor and speed up the bottlenecks with Altera’s C to hardware program.</p><p>The study shows that the C-code needs to be optimized for C to hardware to manage the up speeding part, as the tests showed that the calculation time for the algorithm actually became longer with C to hardware. This thesis also shows that it is highly probable to use an FPGA equipped with Altera’s NIOS II safety critical microprocessor instead of a digital signal processor to control the electrical high lift motors in the Boeing 787 aircraft.</p>