Parameter Estimation and Predictive Speed Control of Chopper-Fed Brushed DC Motors

This paper presents an effective speed control method for brushed DC motors fed by a DC chopper using the concept of Finite Control Set-Model Predictive Control (FCS-MPC). As this control algorithm requires the parameters of the controlled object, the estimation of motor parameters is first performed by using two types of data. The first data includes the output speed response corresponding to the step input voltage to obtain the transfer function in the no-load regime. The second data consists of the motor speed and armature current when a load torque is applied to the motor shaft. The discrete-time equation of the motor armature circuit is used to obtain the future values of the armature circuit current and the motor speed. A cost function is defined based on the difference between the reference and predicted motor speed. The optimal switching states of the DC chopper are selected corresponding to the maximum value of the cost function. The performance of the proposed speed control algorithm is validated on an experimental system. The simulation and experimental results obtained show that the MPC controller can outperform the conventional proportional-integral (PI) controller.