Embedded

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Code Generation

DEMO MODEL

Sensorless Field-Oriented Control of PMSM

Using the IHM03 Motor Control Pack Hardware

Last updated in STM32 TSP 1.0.1

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 Sensorless Field-Oriented Control of PMSM

1 Overview
This STM32 demo model features a drive system with a three-phase brushless DC motor (BLDC), with
sinusoidal back-emf. The following sections describe the implementation of the power stage and con-
trols in detail. Below are the highlights of this demo model.
• It provides an explanation of the typical workflow of the PLECS Coder for embedded targets, using
an STM32G4x or STM32F3x microcontroller (MCU) from STMicroelectronics.
• Shows the implementation of a rotor position and speed observer for sensorless field oriented control
(FOC) strategy.
• Implements a closed-loop cascaded controller with inner d and q axis current controller and outer
speed controller.
• The model is split into two distinct subsystems called “Plant” and “Controller”. This allows the same
model to be used for –
• Offline simulation in PLECS
• Hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) testing with the PLECS RT Box
• Rapid control prototyping (RCP) with the P-NUCLEO-IHM03 motor control pack from STMicro-
electronics [3].
The following sections provide a description of the model and instructions on how to simulate the
model, and deploy the control code to the STM32 target.

1.1 Requirements
In order to run this model you will need:
• PLECS Blockset or Standalone 4.5.5 or newer
• PLECS Coder
• STM32 Target Support Package 1.0.1 or newer
• RT Box Target Support Package
For RCP:
• 1 P-NUCLEO-IHM03 STM32 Motor Control Nucleo Pack
For HIL:
• 1 PLECS RT Box
• 1 NUCLEO-G431RB STM32 Nucleo board
• 1 RT Box NUCLEO Interface board
The Plant model can be executed on all versions of the RT Box. Alternatively, the controller can also
be executed on a NUCLEO-F303RE board.

Note This model contains model initialization commands that are accessible from:
PLECS Standalone: The menu Simulation + Simulation Parameters... + Initializations
PLECS Blockset: Right click in the Simulink model window + Model Properties + Callbacks +
InitFcn*

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 Sensorless Field-Oriented Control of PMSM

2 Model
The top level schematic contains two separate subsystems representing the controller and the plant
models, as shown in Fig. 1. Both subsystems are enabled for code generation from the Subsystem +
Execution settings... context menu. This step is necessary to generate the model code for a subsys-
tem via the PLECS Coder.

EN\FAULT EN\FAULT LED Blinking

Trimmer IN_UVW IN_UVW SENSE_UVW
EN_UVW EN_UVW
R17 Ia !STDBY STBY\RESET
Ibc
NTC
LED
VBUS VBUS
USER Button

USER Controller Plant

Button

R: 47e3
Temperature
Vdd sensing circuit
R: 10e3 V

Figure 1: Top level schematic of the demo model

2.1 Plant
The power circuit, as shown in Fig. 2, includes a permanent magnet synchronous machine (PMSM)
and a three-phase full bridge voltage source inverter (VSI), and is supplied by a DC source voltage (Vi )
of Vdc = 12 V. The VSI is composed of three MOSFET Half Bridge power module components.
The subsystem labeled “STSPIN830” models a basic functionality of the STSPIN830 three-phase motor
driver [4].
The six pulse-width modulated (PWM) switching signals are obtained from the PWM Capture block
of the PLECS RT Box library. Further details on the power module components and the sub-cycle av-
eraging of PWM signals are described in [6]. The DC input voltage and the AC output stator current
measurements are connected to Analog Out blocks from the PLECS RT Box library. The discretization
step size of the plant subsystem is set to 3 µs.

Probe
Analog
Scope Out

SENSE_UVW
sw1
sw3
sw5

Analog
Vi V
Out

VBUS sw2
sw4
sw6
Perm.-Magnet SM

Digital sw1
EN\FAULT
In sw2
PWM sw3
sw
EN\FAULT IN_UVW sw4
Capture sw5
sw6
Digital IN_UVW
EN_UVW Digital
In z-1
Digital Out
EN_UVW STBY\RESET
In NOT LED Blinking
STBY\RESET STSPIN830 channel: 31

Figure 2: Power circuit of the PMSM drive system

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 Sensorless Field-Oriented Control of PMSM

Machine Parameters

The machine parameters are listed in the table below, which were taken partly from the data esti-
mated on the real hardware by using the motor profiler software provided by STMicroelectronics [5].

Specifications of the GBM2804H-100T motor

Number of pole pairs 7

Maximum Torque (Nm) 0.981
Maximum Speed (rpm) 2180
Stator Resistance (Ω) 4.7
Stator Inductance (mH) 0.96
Inertia (nNms2 ) 497
Friction (nNms) 755
Back EMF Voltage (V/krpm) 4.85

2.2 Controller
In the controller subsystem, shown in Fig. 3, the three stator currents are measured by Analog In
(Triggered) blocks from the STM32 Target component library. They represent injected conversions
and the start of conversion is triggered by an external event, in this case a PWM underflow event. The
DC-Bus voltage is monitored by using a regular ADC channel. A regular ADC channel is continuously
converted in the background without any intervention of the CPU. The same type of ADC is used to
sense the temperature on the PCB and the speed reference provided by the trimmer R17 mounted on
the X-NUCLEO-IHM16M1 board.
Rotor-field oriented control is applied to the drive system and the basic structure is shown in Fig 3.
The stator currents are regulated in the dq rotating frame. The speed and rotor position are calcu-
lated by the subsystem labeled “Observer”. An outer control loop, which is a speed controller, is im-
plemented, where a speed reference in RPM is manually set either via a constant block, or via the
trimmer R17 on the X-NUCLEO-IHM16M1 board. The speed reference via the trimmer can be varied
between 200 and 1500 RPM. Rotating the trimmer in a clockwise direction decreases the speed refer-
ence.

Note The complete controller can be enabled or disabled via the blue “User” push-button on the NU-
CLEO board.

Voltage control variables in the dq rotating frame are derived from Eq. 1, when Lsd = Lsq .
           
d
ud Rs −ωLsq id Lsd 0 dt id 0
  =  · + · +  (1)
d
uq ωLsd Rs iq 0 Lsq dt iq ωψf

PI current controller

The d and q axis currents are controlled by two separate PI controllers, and are included in the sub-
system labeled “dq-current controller”, shown in Fig. 4. The proportional and integral gains are de-
signed to achieve a given bandwidth and phase-margin.

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 Sensorless Field-Oriented Control of PMSM

Voltage Task Low Priority Task

ST
ST
1 Digital
ADC 1 Out
ST Blink
Task * vBus
max / run LED
ADC
Ia calibEn
ST
0.0
ST
VBUS ADC 0.0
bus voltage
PCB
ADC
NTC temperature
Task − abc
+
Ibc θ dq

Speed Task

θ, ω ωm*
1/p K
Observer
1200 Id*
iγδ θ θ
state f(u) 0 0 uγδ* ωe ωe
ST

ADC +
−
e o

Rate speed V*->d ST

ADC
Trimmer controller Idq
Idq* Vs* dq vBus * i o PWM
ωe 1/p ωe ωe θ abc
*
rpmStart
dq-current IN_UVW
controller RepCtrPeriod: 2
RepCtrEvent: Underflow
pwmEn NOT rst
ST ST calibEn calibEn
ST ST
Powerstage Digital Base Task Digital pwmEn pwmEn
1 en 0
button
startUp startUp
Protection Out Load In ωe w_est
run run
CPU load USER Button state state
Powerstage EN_UVW Load Start Up Sequence
ST ST 0
Digital Digital
state ~= 6 State
Out Out

!STDBY EN\FAULT

Figure 3: Controller model of the sensorless rotor-field oriented control

u*

+
e PI(s) u +
−
−
Idq*
d-axis

Ls *
Idq *
Vs*
Saturation

u*
+
e PI(s) u +
+
+
startUp NOT

q-axis

Phi
ωe

Figure 4: PI controller in dq frame

Rotor position and speed observer

The subsystem labeled “Observer” is shown in Fig. 5. This is developed according to [1], and is concep-
tually explained below. This observer can be utilized by any type of synchronous motor such as a sur-
face PMSM (non-salient Ld = Lq ), interior PMSM (with saliency Ld < Lq ) and synchronous reluctance
motor.
In the observer model as seen in Fig. 5, the estimated rotating γδ frame is used, which differs from the
dq reference frame with respect to the position error θe . The position error θe is obtained from the ex-

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 Sensorless Field-Oriented Control of PMSM

tended electromotive force (EMF), estimated by the observer. This position error θe is used to estimate
the rotor position and speed.
Fig. 6 shows the conceptual block diagram of the least-order observer for estimating eγ ; g is the ob-
server gain, and is set to 600. The δ-axis component of eδ is estimated in the same way as eγ . The blue
dotted frame in Fig. 6 outlines how the observer is embedded in the overall model.
All integrators in the observer can be reset by a reset signal.

Observer
Gain
iγδ
+ +
+ −

rst
K

eγ
* Rs + run NOT θe θe ω0
* +
eδ run NOT 1/s mod
uγδ*
θ error ω 2*pi θ
Math
Ls df/dt

rst
− −
+ +

rst
Observer ωe
Gain1
run NOT

Figure 5: Schematic of the rotor position and the speed observer

Figure 6: Equivalent block diagram of the least-order observer

Speed Control

An outer speed control loop controls the drive speed. The time constants of the outer control loop is
dictated by the mechanical time constant, which is larger in comparison to the inner current control
loop.
The proportional-integral speed controller can be described by Eq. 2.

Te∗
 
Ki
= Kp + (2)
∆ωm s
∗
where, Te∗ is the reference torque, ∆ωm = ωm − ωm , Kp is the proportional gain and Ki is the integral
gain.
The manipulated variable of the speed controller, which is the reference torque, Te∗ , is the setpoint for
the inner current controller loop. Therefore, a conversion from mechanical torque, Te∗ , to current set-
point, i∗q , is done using Eq. 3.

3
Te∗ = Ψm i∗q p (3)
2

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 Sensorless Field-Oriented Control of PMSM

where, Ψm is the flux linkage of the permanent magnets and p is the number of rotor permanent mag-
net pole pairs.

Multi-tasking code

The PLECS Coder and the STM32 Target Support Package allow the user to generate multi-tasking
code for the STM32 family of MCUs. Multi-tasking code unlocks processing power for controls reg-
ulating multiple system outputs with dynamics on a range of time-scales. In this model there is a
cascaded control scheme with a fast inner current control loop, and a slower outer speed loop. Multi-
tasking code is well suited for this type of control scheme.
Multi-tasking code generation is configured in the Scheduling tab of the Coder + Coder options...
dialog. By changing the Tasking mode to multi-tasking and the Task configuration to specify,
the sample time for each task can be configured. The base sample time is always equal to the Dis-
cretization step size. The Sample time setting for lower priority tasks must be an integer multi-
ple of the base sample time. Up to 15 slower lower priority tasks that execute at different rates can be
specified, preserving processor time for the fastest, highest priority task in the application. For further
information, refer to the "Code Generation" section in the PLECS User Manual [7].
Blocks in the PLECS schematic are assigned to lower priority tasks using the Task library component.
In this model three lower priority tasks are defined in addition to the Base Task, as seen in Fig. 3.
The table below lists the sample times of the lower priority tasks, with respect to the Base Task. The
execution rate of the Base Task for ther STM32G431RB target, in this case is 20 kHz, the same as
switching frequency (fsw). For the STM32F303RE board, a repetition counter of 4 is used to reduce
the execution rate of the Base Task to half the switching frequency.

Task name Sample time

Base Task 1/fsw

Voltage Task 10/fsw
Speed Task 20/fsw
Low Priority Task 10000/fsw

Start-up Sequence

A state-machine is implemented to handle the start-up process of the drive. The state-machine waits
in the Idle state, until the blue “User” push-button on the NUCLEO-board is pushed. Once this but-
ton is pushed, it triggers the transition to the OffsetCalib, or offset calibration state. In this state, the
offset due to the shunt current measurements is calibrated during a fixed period of time. After this
calibration time is expired, the start-up is initiated. When the the blue “User” push-button is pushed
again for a second time, the state machine goes back to the Idle state and the PWM signals are dis-
abled.

3 Simulation
3.1 PLECS Offline Simulation Results
Run the model as provided from Simulation + Start, to observe the results from the offline simula-
tion. Fig. 7 shows the results from the Scope in the “Controller” subsystem.
At 0.05 s, the start-up process is initiated. First, the static measurement offset of the current ADC
channels is removed. At 0.05 s the current reference is ramped up. Once the motor position is aligned,
the motor starts spinning with a speed reference of 500 RPM. When the estimated speed reaches this

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 Sensorless Field-Oriented Control of PMSM

speed reference, the motor starts tracking the final speed reference value of 1200 RPM provided by a
constant block. The rate of change of the speed reference is limited to 2000 RPM/s.

Phase Currents
1
Ia
Ib
Ic
Current (A)

-1
Rotational angle (rad)
Observer
6
Angle (rad)

0
Rotational Shaft Speed
1500
Rotational speed (rp…

Reference
Observer
1000

500

0
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
Time (s)
Figure 7: Offline simulation result of the PMSM starting-up with a speed reference of 500 RPM and
ramping up to 1200 RPM at 0.5 s

3.2 Configuring the STM32 Target

In addition to running a simulation of this demo model in offline mode on a computer, the “Controller”
subsystem can be directly converted into target specific code for the STM32G431RB or STM32F303RE
NUCLEO board. The model is configured by default for a STM32G431RB NUCELO board, but other
targets are supported. From the Model initialization commands window of Simulation Parame-
ters... + Initializations tab from the Simulation menu, change the value of type_evm, to choose the
desired target in order to adapt the I/O configuration. You must also configure the corresponding Tar-
get in the Coder Options window accordingly. Optionally, the “Plant” subsystem can be deployed on
the PLECS RT Box to perform a hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) test of the generated code. The controller
is also configured to work with the NUCLEO-IHM03 experimental kit offered by ST.
Follow the instructions below to upload the “Controller” subsystem to a STM32 MCU.
• Connect the MCU to the host computer through a USB cable.
• From the System tab of the Coder + Coder options... window, select “Controller”.

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 Sensorless Field-Oriented Control of PMSM

• Next, from the Target tab, select STM32G4x or STMF3x from the dropdown menu. Then under the
General sub-tab, select G431RB or F303RE.
• To deploy the MCU target directly from PLECS, uncheck the Generate code only parameter,
choose the desired Programming interface from the dropdown menu. The default programming
interface is OpenOCD.
• Then click Build.
If programmed correctly, the green LED “LD2” on the NUCLEO board should blink.

Note Verify the jumper configuration on the NUCLEO board: JP5 on 5V_STLK, JP8 in position [1–2],
JP6 closed.

3.3 Configuring the PLECS RT Box

Prior to controlling a real power stage with the programmed MCU, it is highly recommended to first
verify the behavior of the controller using a PLECS RT Box and perform a HIL test. A typical hard-
ware configuration is shown in Fig. 8, where the NUCLEO board (the light blue board) is connected to
the RT Box via an RT Box NUCLEO Interface board (the green board).
Follow the instructions below to run a real-time model on the RT Box. The “Plant” subsystem is exe-
cutable on all the RT Box platforms.
• From the System tab of the Coder + Coder options... window, select “Plant”. Click the Target tab
and select a target device. Then click Build to deploy the model to the target RT Box.
• Once the model is uploaded, from the External Mode tab of the Coder options... window, Con-
nect to the RT Box and Activate autotriggering to observe the test results in real time.
If programmed correctly, the LED corresponding to “DO-31” of the RT Box NUCLEO Interface board
should blink.
PLECS RT Box

STM32 G431RB
RT Box Interface board

Figure 8: Hardware setup for the HIL verification

3.4 Executing a Closed-Loop HIL Test

Enable the MCU by pushing the blue “User” push-button on the NUCLEO board. This initiates the
start-up sequence and PWM signal generation. If the start-up is successful, the speed controller will
automatically track the speed reference and the green LED “LD2” on the NUCLEO board turns solid

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 Sensorless Field-Oriented Control of PMSM

ON. Observe the real-time waveforms in the Scope of the “Plant” subsystem. From the Model initial-
ization commands window of Simulation Parameters... + Initializations tab from the Simula-
tion menu, change the value of type_evm, to choose the desired target in order to adapt the I/O con-
figuration. In the same dialog, also change th value of application to “rt_box”. Make sure that the
speed reference source in the “Controller” subsystem is connected to the constant block. The speed ref-
erence value of the constant block can be changed on the fly, in real-time, since the component has
been added to the “Exceptions” list found in the Parameter Inlining tab of the Coder options...
window, prior to building the model. To observe any intermediate values calculated on the MCU and
to change the speed reference in the constant block, follow the instructions below to connect to the ex-
ternal mode of the STM32 MCU.
• First, Disconnect the “Plant” subsystem from the External Mode of the PLECS RT Box, if con-
nected.
• From the System menu on the left hand side of the Coder + Coder options... window, select “Con-
troller”.
• Next, from the External Mode tab, select the appropriate Target device and click Connect.
• Then, Activate autotriggering to observe the test results in the “Controller” subsystem Scope.
Then, connect to the external mode of the RT Box again following the instructions provided in Sec-
tion 3.3.
To stop the motor from spinning, push the blue “User” push-button on the NUCLEO board once again.
This will stop the PWM signal generation and the controller will enter an idle state, waiting for the
next start-up sequence to be initiated by the user.

3.5 Executing a Closed-Loop RCP Test

Finally, the generated control code running on the NUCLEO board can also be used to spin the motor
provided with the NUCLEO-IHM03 experimental kit offered by ST. From the Model initialization
commands window of Simulation Parameters... + Initializations tab from the Simulation menu,
change the value of type_evm, to choose the desired target in order to adapt the I/O configuration. In
the same dialog, also change th value of application to “rcp”. Follow the instructions below to setup
the hardware to test the generated control code with the NUCLEO motor-control pack.
• The X-NUCLEO-IHM16M1 must be stacked on the NUCLEO board through the CN7 and CN10 ST
morpho connectors. Mind the direction of placement of the IHM16M1 board. The two buttons on the
NUCLEO board must still be accessible.
• Connect the three motor wires on the CN1 connector.
• Check the jumper settings on the X-NUCLEO-IHM16M1 board: J5 and J6 closed, J2 closed on posi-
tion [2–3] and J3 closed on position [1–2].
• Connect the 12 V DC power supply (use the power supply provided with the pack or an equivalent
one) on CN1 or J4.
In the end, your setup should look similar to Fig. 9.
Then program your MCU via the PLECS Coder following the instructions given in Section 3.2. If pro-
grammed correctly, the green LED “LD2” on the NUCLEO board should blink.
Enable the MCU by pushing the blue “User” push-button on the NUCLEO board. This initiates the
start-up sequence and PWM signal generation. If the start-up is successful, the speed controller will
automatically track the speed reference and the green LED “LD2” on the NUCLEO board turns solid
ON.
To observe any intermediate values calculated on the MCU and to change the speed reference source,
follow the instructions below to connect to the external mode of the STM32 MCU.
• From the System menu on the left hand side of the Coder + Coder options... window, select “Con-
troller”.
• Next, from the External Mode tab, select the appropriate Target device and click Connect.
• Then, Activate autotriggering to observe the test results in the “Controller” subsystem Scope.

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 Sensorless Field-Oriented Control of PMSM

Figure 9: Hardware setup for the RCP verification

Rotate the potentiometer on the X-NUCLEO-IHM16M1 board to change the motor speed reference.
For this to work, the speed reference source in the “Controller” subsystem must be connected to the
ADC “Trimmer” signal.
To stop the motor from spinning, push the blue “User” push-button on the NUCLEO board once again.
This will stop the PWM signal generation and the controller will enter an idle state, waiting for the
next start-up sequence to be initiated by the user.

4 Conclusion
This model demonstrated the sensorless FOC control application of a PMSM drive system using the
NUCLEO-IHM03 experimental kit. It provided three modes of simulation with step-by-step instruc-
tions.
• Offline simulation in PLECS
• Hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) testing with the PLECS RT Box
• Rapid control prototyping (RCP) with the P-NUCLEO-IHM03 motor control pack from STMicroelec-
tronics [3]

References
[1] S. Morimoto, K. Kawamoto, M. Sanada and Y. Takeda, "Sensorless control strategy for salient-
pole PMSM based on extended EMF in rotating reference frame", IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol. 38,
no. 4, pp. 1054-1061, Jul./Aug. 2002.
[2] R. De Doncker, D. Pulle and A. Veltman, “Advanced electrical drives”, Springer, 2011.

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 Sensorless Field-Oriented Control of PMSM

[3] Motor Control Nucleo Pack with NUCLEO-G431RB and X-NUCLEO-IHM16M1,

URL: https://www.st.com/en/evaluation-tools/p-nucleo-ihm03.html
[4] STSPIN830 Compact and versatile three-phase and three-sense BLDC motor driver,
URL: https://www.st.com/en/motor-drivers/stspin830.html
[5] STM32 Motor Control Software Development Kit (MCSDK),
URL: https://www.st.com/en/embedded-software/x-cube-mcsdk.html
[6] J. Allmeling, and N. Felderer, “Sub cycle average models with integrated diodes for real-time sim-
ulation of power converters,” IEEE Southern Power Electronics Conference (SPEC), 2017.
[7] PLECS User Manual,
URL: https://www.plexim.com/sites/default/files/plecsmanual.pdf.

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 Revision History:

STM32 TSP 1.0.1 First release

How to Contact Plexim:

% +41 44 533 51 00 Phone

+41 44 533 51 01 Fax
) Plexim GmbH Mail
Technoparkstrasse 1
8005 Zurich
Switzerland
@ [email protected] Email
http://www.plexim.com Web

Embedded Code Generation Demo Model

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