This thesis focuses on utilizing the persistent voltage vector injections by finite control set model predictive control (FCSMPC) to enable simultaneous estimations of both position and parameters in order to realize robust sensorless interior permanent magnet synchronous machine (IPMSM) drives valid at the entire operating region including no-load standstill without any additional signal injection and switchover. The system (here, IPMSM) needs to meet certain observability conditions to identify the parameters and position. Moreover, each combination of the parameters and/or position involves different observability requirements which cannot be accomplished at every operating point. In particular, meeting the observability for parameters and position at no-load standstill is more challenging. This is overcome by generating persistent excitation in the system with high-frequency signal injection. The FCSMPC scheme inherently features the persistent excitation with voltage vector injection and hence no additional signal injection is required. Moreover, the persistent excitation always exists for FCSMPC except at the standstill where the control applies the null vectors when the reference currents are zero. However, introducing a small negative d axis current at the standstill would be sufficient to overcome this situation.The parameter estimations are investigated at first in this thesis. The observability is analyzed for the combinations of two, three and four parameters and experimentally validated by online identification based on recursive least square (RLS) based adaptive observer. The worst case operating points concerning observability are identified and experimentally proved that the online identification of all the parameter combinations could be accomplished with persistent excitation by FCMPC. Moreover, the effect of estimation error in one parameter on the other known as parameter coupling is reduced with the proposed decoupling technique. The persistent voltage vector injections by FCSMPC help to meet the observability conditions for estimating the position, especially at low speeds. However, the arbitrary nature of the switching ripples and absence of PWM modulator void the possibility of applying the standard demodulation based techniques for FCSMPC. Consequently, a nonlinear optimization based observer is proposed to estimate both the position and speed, and experimentally validated from standstill to maximum speed. Furthermore, a compensator is also proposed that prevents converging to saddle and symmetrical ( ambiguity) solutions. The robustness analysis of the proposed nonlinear optimization based observer shows that estimating the position without co-estimating the speed is more robust and the main influencing parameters on the accuracy of the position estimation are d and q inductances. Subsequently, the proposed nonlinear optimization based observer is extended to simultaneously estimate the position, d and q inductances. The experimental results show the substantial improvements in response time, and reduction in both steady and transient state position errors. In summary, this thesis presents the significance of persistent voltage vector injections in estimating both parameter and position, and also shows that nonlinear optimization based technique is an ideal candidate for robust sensorless FCSMPC. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

This dissertation is devoted to a unified and comprehensive study of zero-current-transition (ZCT) soft-switching techniques for high-power three-phase PWM inverter applications. Major efforts in this study are as follows: 1) Conception of one new ZCT scheme and one new ZCT topology; 2) Systematic comparison of a family of ZCT inverters; 3) Design, implementation and experimental evaluation of two 55-kW prototype inverters for electric vehicle (EV) motor drives that are developed based on the proposed ZCT concepts; and 4) Investigation of the ZCT concepts in megawatts high-frequency power conversions. The proposed ZCT techniques are also applicable to three-phase power-factor-correction (PFC) rectifiers. In order to minimize switching losses, this work first proposes a new control scheme for an existing three-phase ZCT inverter circuit that uses six auxiliary switches. The proposed scheme, called the six-switch ZV/ZCT, enables all main switches, diodes and auxiliary switches to be turned off under zero-current conditions, and in the meantime provides an opportunity to achieve zero-voltage turn-on for the main switches. Meanwhile, it requires no modification to normal PWM algorithms. Compared with existing ZCT schemes, the diode reverse-recovery current is reduced significantly, the switching turn-on loss is reduced by 50%, the resonant capacitor voltage stress is reduced by 30%, and the current and thermal stresses in the auxiliary switches are evenly distributed. However, a big drawback of the six-switch ZV/ZCT topology, as well as of other types of soft-switching topologies using six auxiliary switches, is the high cost and large space associated with the auxiliary switches. To overcome this drawback, this work further proposes a new three-phase ZCT inverter topology that uses only three auxiliary switches-- the three-switch ZCT. The significance of the proposed three-switch ZCT topology is that, among three-phase soft-switching inverters developed so far, this is the only one that uses fewer than six auxiliary switches and still has the following three features: 1) soft commutation for all main switches, diodes and auxiliary switches in all operation modes; 2) no modification to normal PWM algorithms; and 3) in practical implementations, no need for extra resonant current sensing, saturable cores, or snubbers to protect the auxiliary switches. The proposed six-switch ZV/ZCT and three-switch ZCT inverters, together with existing ZCT inverters, constitute a family of three-phase ZCT inverters. To explore the fundamental properties of these inverters, a systematic comparative study is conducted. A simplified equivalent circuit is developed to unify common traits of ZCT commutations. With the visual aid of state planes, the evolution of the family of ZCT inverters is examined, and their differences and connections are identified. Behaviors of individual inverters, including switching conditions, circulating energy, and device/component stresses, are compared. Based on the proposed six-switch ZV/ZCT and three-switch ZCT techniques, two 55-kW prototype inverters for EV traction motor drives have been built and tested to the full-power level with a closed-loop controlled induction motor dynamometer. The desired ZCT soft-switching features are realized together with motor drive functions. A research effort is carried out to develop a systematic and practical design methodology for the ZCT inverters, and an experimental evaluation of the ZCT techniques in the EV motor drive application is conducted. The design approach integrates system optimization with characterizations of the main IGBT device under the ZCT conditions, selection, testing and characterization of the auxiliary devices, design and selection of the resonant inductors and capacitors, inverter loss modeling and numerical analysis, system-level operation aspects, and layout and parasitic considerations. Different design aspects between these two ZCT inverters are compared and elaborated. The complexity of the 55-kW prototype implementations is compared as well. Efficiencies are measured and compared under a group of torque/speed points for typical EV drive cycles. Megawatts high-frequency power conversion is another potential application of the ZCT techniques. The integrated gate commutated thyristor (IGCT) device is tested and characterized under the proposed six-switch ZV/ZCT condition, and the test shows promising results in reducing switching losses and stresses. Improvements in the IGCT switching frequency and simplification of the cooling requirements under ZCT operations are discussed. In addition, a generalized ZCT cell concept is developed based on the proposed three-switch ZCT topology. This concept leads to the discovery of a family of simplified multilevel soft-switching inverters that reduce the number of auxiliary switches by half, and still maintain desirable features. / Ph. D.

In this dissertation, a novel two-phase switched reluctance machine (SRM) with a stator comprised of E-core structure having minimum stator core iron is presented for low-cost high-performance applications. In addition, three new magnetic structures for the E-core SRM comprising two segmented stator cores or a monolithic stator core are proposed for good manufacturability, mechanically robustness, ease of assembly, and electromagnetic performance improvement. Each E-core stator in the segmented structure has three poles with two small poles at the ends having windings and a large center pole containing no copper windings. The common stator pole at the centers in the segmented E-core is shared by both phases during operation. Other benefits of the common poles contributing to performance enhancement are short flux paths, mostly flux-reversal-free-stator, constant minimum reluctance around air gap, and wide pole arc equal to one rotor pole pitch. Therefore, two additional common poles in the monolithic E-core configuration are able to significantly improve efficiency due to more positive torque and less core loss by the unique design. Using a full MEC analysis, the effect of the common-pole structure on torque enhancement is analytically verified. Efficiency estimated from the dynamic simulation is higher by 7% and 12% at 2000 rpm and by 3% and 7 % at 3000 rpm for the segmented and single-body SRMs, respectively, compared to a conventional SRM with four stator poles and two rotor poles. The new E-core SRMs are suitable for low-cost high-performance applications which are strongly cost competitive since all the new E-core SRMs have 20% cost savings on copper and the segmented E-core SRMs have 20% steel savings as well. Strong correlation between simulated and experimentally measured results validates the feasibility of the E-core common-pole structure and its performance. A simple step-by-step analytical design procedure suited for iterative optimization with small computational effort is developed with the information of the monolithic E-core SRM, and the proposed design approach can be applied for other SRM configurations as well. For investigating thermal characteristics in the two-phase single-body E-core SRM, the machine is modeled by a simplified lumped-parameter thermal network in which there are nine major parts of the motor assembly. / Ph. D.

The inverter dead-time is integral to the safety of a voltage source inverter (VSI). Dead-time is introduced between the complementary gating signals of the top and bottom switches in each VSI leg to prevent shoot-through fault. This thesis reports and investigates dead-time induced sub-harmonic oscillations in open-loop induction motor drives of different power levels, under light-load conditions. The thesis develops mathematical models that help understand and predict the oscillatory behaviour of such motor drives due to dead-time act. Models are also developed to study the impact of under-compensation and over-compensation of dead-time act on stability. The various models are validated through extensive simulations and experimental results. The thesis also proposes and validates active damping schemes for mitigation of such sub-harmonic oscillations. The thesis reports high-amplitude sub-harmonic oscillations in the stator current, torque and speed of a 100-kW open-loop induction motor drive in the laboratory, operating under no-load. Experimental studies, carried out on 22-kW, 11-kW, 7.5-kW and 3.7-kW open-loop induction motor drives, establish the prevalence of dead-time induced sub-harmonic oscillations in open-loop motor drives of different power levels. An experimental procedure is established for systematic study of this phenomenon in industrial drives. This procedure yields the operating region, if any, where the motor drive is oscillatory. As a first step towards understanding the oscillatory behaviour of the motor drive, a mathematical model of the VSI is derived in a synchronously revolving reference frame (SRF), incorporating the of dead-time on the inverter output voltage. This leads to a modified dynamic model of the inverter-fed induction motor in the SRF, inclusive of the dead-time act. While the rotor dynamic equations are already non-linear, dead-time is found to introduce nonlinearities in the stator dynamic equations as well. The nonlinearities in the modified dynamic model make even the steady solution non-trivial. Under steady conditions, the dead-time can be modelled as the drop across an equivalent resistance (Req0) in the stator circuit. A precise method to evaluate the equivalent resistance Req0 and a simple method to arrive at the steady solution are proposed and validated. For the purpose of stability analysis, a small-signal model of the drive is then derived by linearizing the non-linear dynamic equations of the motor drive, about a steady-state operating point. The proposed small-signal model shows that dead-time contributes to different values of equivalent resistances along the q-axis and d-axis and also to equivalent cross-coupling reactance’s that appear in series with the stator windings. Stability analysis performed using the proposed model brings out the region of oscillatory behaviour (or region of small-signal instability) of the 100-kW motor drive on the voltage versus frequency (V- f) plane, considering no-load. The oscillatory region predicted by the small-signal analysis is in good agreement with simulations and practical observations for the 100-kW motor drive. The small-signal analysis is also able to predict the region of oscillatory behaviour of an 11-kW motor drive, which is con consumed by simulations and experiments. The analysis also predicts the frequencies of sub-harmonic oscillations at different operating points quite well for both the drives. Having the validity of the small-signal analysis at different power levels, this analytical procedure is used to predict the regions of oscillatory behaviour of 2-pole, 4-pole, 6-pole and 8-pole induction motors rated 55 kW and 110 kW. The impact of dead-time on inverter output voltage has been studied widely in literature. This thesis studies the influence of dead-time on the inverter input current as well. Based on this study, the dynamic model of the inverter fed induction motor is extended to include the dc-link dynamics as well. Simulation results based on this extended model tally well with the experimentally measured dc-link voltage and stator current waveforms in the 100-kW drive. Dead-time compensation may be employed to mitigate the dead-time and oscillatory behaviour of the drive. However, accurate dead-time compensation is challenging to achieve due to various factors such as delays in gate drivers, device switching characteristics, etc. Effects of under-compensation and over-compensation of dead time are investigated in this thesis. Under-compensation is shown to result in the same kind of oscillatory behaviour as observed with dead-time, but the fundamental frequency range over which such oscillations occur is reduced. On the other hand, over-compensation of dead-time effect is shown to result in a different kind of oscillatory behaviour. These two types of oscillatory behaviour due to under- and over-compensation, respectively, are distinguished and demonstrated by analyses, simulations and experiments on the 100-kW drive. To mitigate the oscillatory behaviour of the drive, an active damping scheme is proposed. This scheme emulates the effect of an external inductor in series with the stator winding. A small-signal model is proposed for an induction motor drive with the proposed active damping scheme. Simulations and experiments on the 100-kW drive demonstrate effective mitigation of light-load instability with this active damping scheme. In the above inductance emulation scheme, the emulated inductance is seen by the sub-harmonic components, fundamental component as well as low-order harmonic components of the motor current. Since the emulated inductance is also seen by the fundamental component, there is a fundamental voltage drop across the emulated inductance, leading to reduced co-operation of the induction motor. Hence, an improved active damping scheme is proposed wherein the emulated inductance is seen only by the sub-harmonic and low-order harmonic components. This is achieved through appropriate altering in the synchronously revolving domain. The proposed improved active damping scheme is shown to mitigate the sub-harmonic oscillation effectively without any reduction in flux.

This thesis aims to identify methods for detection of damper winding faults in synchronous machines (SMs) powered by variable frequency drives (VFDs). The problem of failing damper windings has received attention after reports of serious damage which have been discovered during maintenance checks. Since SMs often are used for critical applications, failures can be devastating if they cause total breakdowns. Also, VFDs are believed to cause additional stress in the damper windings of SMs and since the utilisation of VFDs is increasing, the problem is expected to become more common in the future. Currently, there is no method for detection of failures during normal operation of SMs, thus research in the area is required. Simulations based on the finite element method as well as laboratory experiments have been performed in order to examine the impact of VFDs and to find a way of detecting damper winding failures. The results confirm that utilization of VFDs produce higher currents in the damper winding compared to direct-online operation. The results also show that in case of a damper bar failure, the current distribution among the damper winding segments is affected. However, monitoring of all damper winding segments is unrealistic due to the number of sensors required. Another approach, which has been investigated, involves monitoring of the current through the pole interconnectors of one of the endrings. Potential fault indicators have been found by analysing the currents in the frequency domain. However, further studies are required in order to evaluate the method. Also the temperature of the damper winding was investigated as an indicator.

This thesis analyses, develops and implements a very fast on-line parameter identification algorithm for both rotor and stator resistances of a rotor flux oriented induction motor drive, with the best possible convergence results using artificial neural networks and fuzzy logic systems. The thesis focuses mainly on identifying the rotor resistance, which is the most critical parameter for RFOC. Limitations of PI and fuzzy logic based estimators were identified. Artificial neural network based estimators were found to track the rotor and stator resistances of the drive accurately and fast. The rotor flux of the induction motor estimated with a classical voltage model was the key input of the rotor resistance estimator. Because, pure digital integrators were unable to play this role, an alternative rotor flux synthesizer using a programmable cascaded filter was developed. This rotor flux synthesizer has been used for all of the resistance estimators. It was found that the error in rotor resistance estimation using an ANN was contributed to by error in the stator resistance (caused by motor heating). Several stator resistance estimators using the stator current measurements were developed. The limitations of a PI and a fuzzy estimator for stator resistance estimation were also established. A new stator resistance identifier using an ANN was found to be much superior to the PI and fuzzy estimators, both in terms of dynamic estimation times and convergence problems. The rotor resistance estimator developed for this thesis used a feedforward neural network and the stator resistance estimator used a recurrent neural network. Both networks exhibited excellent learning capabilities; the stator resistance estimator network was very fast as it had a feedback input. A speed estimator was also developed with the state estimation principles, with the updated motor parameters supplied by the ANN estimators. Analysis for speed sensorless operation has shown that the stator and rotor resistances could be updated on-line.

No description available.

<p>As a cost-effective, healthy, and environmentally friendly personal mode of transportation, electric bicycles (E-bikes) are gaining an increasing market share from conventional bicycles and automobiles. Considering the legal rules in Ontario, Canada, a 500W motor makes the E-bike more attractive for travelling use. At the same time, the simple structure, high torque and power density, as well as the low cost of the switched reluctance machine (SRM) makes it a strong candidate for E-bikes.</p> <p>In this thesis, a 3-phase, external-rotor SRM with 6 stator poles and 10 rotor poles is designed for E-bike. The design of an external rotor arrangement of the 6-10 SRM topology has not previously been reported, hence it offers a new contribution to the published works. The machine design is initiated by the output power equation and is followed by a comprehensive finite element analysis (FEA). The external-rotor arrangement is chosen to facilitate ease of integration into the wheel hub structure of a typical pedal bicycle. The increasing rotor poles yield improved torque ripple reduction than more conventional (i.e. 6-4, 12-8 etc.) SRM design, which is an essential feature for low speed rider comfort.</p> <p>A new torque ripple reduction control scheme is investigated. Although the comparison shows that the torque sharing function has more positive result than angular position control with regards to torque ripple, this is at the expense of higher losses. Detailed thermal analysis ensures this machine is suitable to require no additional cooling system. The final machine design is experimentally tested via a full system prototype. Results highlight some limitation of the 2-D FEA in terms of the winding inductance calculation. Here, the end winding introduce more influence on short thickness machine, which will reduce its output power. However, its power-speed curve shows that this prototype machine has very strong overload ability.</p> / Master of Applied Science (MASc)

The increasing shift towards more electric or all electric aircraft urgently necessitates dc/ac converter systems with high power density. Silicon Carbide (SiC) devices, known for their superior performance over traditional silicon-based devices, facilitate this increase in power density. Nonetheless, achieving optimal power density faces challenges due to the unique requirements and conditions of aircraft applications. A primary obstacle is optimizing the topology and parameters of the dc/ac converter system to achieve high power density while adhering to the stringent aerospace EMI standard DO-160 and bearing current limitations. Electric aircraft demand unmatched reliability, necessitating strict control over EMI noise and bearing currents. These considerations significantly impact the selection of topology and parameters to maximize power density. This dissertation assesses how dc voltage, topology, and switching frequency affect component weight, seeking an optimal mix to enhance power density. The methodology and conclusions are validated through a 200-kW motor drive system designed for electric aircraft. Moreover, traditional dc/ac systems are burdened by the weight and space occupied by separate current sensors and short-circuit protection circuits. This work introduces two innovative current sensors that integrate device current sampling with the functionality of traditional shunt resistors, AC hall sensors, and short-circuit protection circuits, thus improving system density and bandwidth. The first sensor, a PCB-based Rogowski coil, integrates with the gate driver and commutation loops, enhancing power density despite challenges in managing CM noise. The second sensor utilizes parasitic inductance in the power loop, with an integrator circuit and an adaptive compensation algorithm correcting errors from parasitic resistance, ensuring high bandwidth accuracy without needing parasitic resistance information. Variable operation conditions from motors pose another challenge, potentially leading to oversized inverters due to uneven loss distribution among switching devices, exacerbated at extreme operating points like motor start-up. This dissertation investigates the loss distribution in multi-level T-Type neutral point clamped (NPC) topology and proposes a novel loss-balance modulation scheme. This scheme ensures even loss distribution across switches, independent of power factor and modulation index, and is applicable to T-type inverters of any level count. Finally, thermal management and insulation at high altitudes present significant challenges. While power devices may be cooled using conventional liquid cooling solutions, components like AC and EMI filters struggle with complex geometries that can create hot spots or high E-field points, complicating filter design for high current applications. A comprehensive design and optimization methodology based on planar heavy-copper PCB design is proposed. By utilizing flexible 2D or 3D E-field shaping and maximizing thermal transfer from copper to ambient, this methodology significantly improves power density and ensures effective heat dissipation and insulation at altitudes up to 50,000 feet. / Doctor of Philosophy / The increasing shift towards more electric or all electric aircraft urgently necessitates dc/ac converter systems with high power density. Silicon Carbide (SiC) devices, known for their superior performance over traditional silicon-based devices, facilitate this increase in power density. Nonetheless, achieving optimal power density faces challenges due to the unique requirements and conditions of aircraft applications. A primary obstacle is optimizing the topology and parameters of the dc/ac converter system to achieve high power density while adhering to the stringent aerospace EMI standard DO-160 and bearing current limitations. Electric aircraft demand unmatched reliability, necessitating strict control over EMI noise and bearing currents. These considerations significantly impact the selection of topology and parameters to maximize power density. This dissertation assesses how dc voltage, topology, and switching frequency affect component weight, seeking an optimal mix to enhance power density. The methodology and conclusions are validated through a 200-kW motor drive system designed for electric aircraft. Moreover, traditional dc/ac systems are burdened by the weight and space occupied by separate current sensors and short-circuit protection circuits. This work introduces two innovative current sensors that integrate device current sampling with the functionality of traditional shunt resistors, AC hall sensors, and short-circuit protection circuits, thus improving system density and bandwidth. The first sensor, a PCB-based Rogowski coil, integrates with the gate driver and commutation loops, enhancing power density despite challenges in managing CM noise. The second sensor utilizes parasitic inductance in the power loop, with an integrator circuit and an adaptive compensation algorithm correcting errors from parasitic resistance, ensuring high bandwidth accuracy without needing parasitic resistance information. Variable operation conditions from motors pose another challenge, potentially leading to oversized inverters due to uneven loss distribution among switching devices, exacerbated at extreme operating points like motor start-up. This dissertation investigates the loss distribution in multi-level T-Type neutral point clamped (NPC) topology and proposes a novel loss-balance modulation scheme. This scheme ensures even loss distribution across switches, independent of power factor and modulation index, and is applicable to T-type inverters of any level count. Finally, thermal management and insulation at high altitudes present significant challenges. While power devices may be cooled using conventional liquid cooling solutions, components like AC and EMI filters struggle with complex geometries that can create hot spots or high E-field points, complicating filter design for high current applications. A comprehensive design and optimization methodology based on planar heavy-copper PCB design is proposed. By utilizing flexible 2D or 3D E-field shaping and maximizing thermal transfer from copper to ambient, this methodology significantly improves power density and ensures effective heat dissipation and insulation at altitudes up to 50,000 feet.

In DC to AC power conversion, voltage source inverters (VSI) based current controllers are usually preferred for today’s high performance AC drive which requires excellent dynamic and steady state performances at different transient and load conditions, with the additional advantages like inherent short circuit and over current protection. Out of different types of current controllers, hysteresis controllers are widely used due to their simplicity and ability to meet the requirements for a high performance AC drives. But the conventional hysteresis controllers suffers from wide variation of PWM switching frequency, overshoot in current errors, sub-harmonic components in the current waveform and non-optimum switching at different operating point of the drive system. To mitigate these problems, particularly to control the switching frequency variation, which is the root cause of all other problems, several methodologies like ramp comparison based controller, predictive current controller, etc. were proposed in the literature. But amplitude and phase offset error in the ramp comparison based controllers and complexities involved in the predictive controllers have limited the use of these controllers. Moreover, these type of controllers, which uses three separate and independently controlled tolerance band (sinusoidal type or adaptive) to control the 3-phase currents, shows limited dynamic responses and they are not simple to implement. To tackle the problem of controlling 3-phase currents simultaneously, space vector based hysteresis current controller is very effective as it combines the current errors of all the three phases as a single entity called current error space vector. It has a single controller’s logic with a hysteresis boundary for controlling this current error space vector. Several papers on space vector based hysteresis controllers for 2-level inverter with constant switching frequency have been published, but the application of the constant switching frequency based hysteresis current controllers for multi¬level inverter fed drive system, has not been addressed properly. Use of multi-level inverter in modern high performance drive for medium and high voltage levels is more prominent because of multi-level’s inherent advantages like good power quality, good electromagnetic compatibility (EMC), better DC link voltage utilization, reduced device voltage rating, so on. Even though some of the earlier works describe three-level space vector based hysteresis current controller techniques, they are specific to the particular level of inverters and does not demonstrate constant switching frequency of operation. This thesis proposes a novel approach where nearly constant switching frequency based hysteresis controller can be implemented for any general n-level inverter and it is also independent of inverter topology. In this work, varying parabolic boundary is used as the hysteresis current error boundary for controlling the current in a multi-level space vector structure. The computation of the parabolic boundary is accomplished offline and all the necessary boundary parameters at different operating points are stored in the look-up tables. The varying parabolic boundary for the multi-level space vector structure depends on the sampled reference phase voltage values which are estimated from stator current error information and then using the equivalent circuit model of induction motors. Here, a mapping technique is adopted to bring down all the three phase references to the inner- most carrier region, which results in mapping any outer triangular structure where tip of the voltage space vector is located, to one of the sectors of the inner most hexagon of the multi-level space vector structure. In this way, the required mapped sector information is easily found out to fix the correct orientation of the parabolic boundary in the space vector plane. This mapping technique simplifies the controller’s logic similar to that of a 2-level inverter. For online identification of the inverter switching voltage vectors constructing the present outer triangle of the multi-level space vector structure, the proposed controller utilizes the sampled phase voltage references. This identification technique is novel and also generic for any n-level inverter structure. This controller is having all the advantages of a space vector based hysteresis current controller and that of a multi-level inverter apart from having a nearly constant switching frequency spectrum similar to that of a voltage controlled space vector PWM (VC-SVPWM). Using the proposed controller, simulation study of a five-level inverter fed induction motor (IM) drive scheme, was carried out using Matlab-Simulink. Simulation study showed that the switching frequency variations in a fundamental cycle and over the entire speed range of the linear modulation region, is similar to that of a VC-SVPWM based multi-level VSI. The proposed hysteresis controller is experimentally verified on a 7.5 kW IM vector control drive fed with a five-level VSI. The proposed current error space vector based hysteresis controller providing nearly constant switching frequency is implemented on a TI TMS320LF2812 DSP and Xilinx XC3S200FT256 FPGA based platform. The three-phase reference currents are generated depending on the frequency command and the controller is tested with the drive for the entire operating speed range of the machine in forward and reverse directions. Steady state and quick transient results of the proposed drive are presented in this thesis. This thesis also proposes another type of hysteresis controller, firstly for 2-level inverter and then for general n-level multi-level inverter, which eliminates the parabolic boundary and replaces it with a boundary which is computed online and does not use any look up table for boundary selection. The current error boundary for the proposed hysteresis controller is computed online in a very simple way, using the information of estimated fundamental stator voltages along α and β axes of space vector plane. The method adopted for the proposed controller to compute the boundary does not involve any complicated computations and it selects the optimal vector for switching when current error space vector crosses the boundary. This way adjacent voltage vector switching similar to VC-SVPWM can be ensured. For 2-level inverter, it precisely determines the sector, in which reference voltage vector is present. In multi-level inverter, this controller also finds out the mapped sector information using the same mapping techniques as explained in the first part of this thesis. In both 2-level and multi-level inverter, the proposed controller does not use any look up table for finding individual voltage vector switching times from the estimated voltage references. These switching times are used for the computation of hysteresis boundary for individual vectors. Thus the hysteresis boundary for individual vectors is exactly calculated and the boundary is similar to that of VC-SVPWM scheme for the respective levels of inverter. In the present scheme, the phase voltage harmonic spectrum is very close to that of a constant switching frequency VC-SVPWM inverter. In this thesis, at first, the proposed on line boundary computation scheme is implemented for a 2-level inverter based controller for the initial study, so that it can be executed as fast as 10 µs in a DSP platform, which is required for accurate current control. Then the same algorithm of 2-level inverter is extended for multi-level inverter with the additional logic for online identification of nearest switching voltage vectors (also used in the parabolic boundary case) for the present sampling interval. Previously mentioned mapping technique for multi-level inverter, is also implemented here to bring down the phase voltage references to the inner-most carrier region to realize the multi-level current control strategy equivalent to that of a 2-level inverter PWM current control. Simulation study to verify the steady state as well as transient performance of the proposed controller for both 2-level as well as five-level VSI fed IM drive is carried out using Simulink tool box of MATLAB Simulation Software. The proposed hysteresis controllers are experimentally verified on a 7.5 kW IM vector control drive fed with a two-level VSI and five-level VSI separately. The proposed current error space vector based hysteresis controller providing nearly constant switching frequency profile for phase voltage is implemented on the TI TMS320LF2812 DSP and Xilinx XC3S200FT256 FPGA based platform. The three-phase reference currents are generated depending on the frequency command and the proposed hysteresis controllers are tested with drive for the entire operating speed range of the machine in forward and reverse directions. Steady state and transient results of the proposed drive are also presented for different operating conditions, through the simulation study followed by experimental verifications. Even though the simulation and experimental verifications are done on a 5-level inverter to explain the proposed hysteresis controller, it can be easily implemented for any general n-level inverter, as described in this thesis.