Better motor use through control

Reference platform for brushless dc motor control engineers to quickly incorporate new controls into appliances, power-tools, fans, pumps, and other products

By Control Engineering Staff February 28, 2008

Renesas Technology America announced an R8C/25-based brushless DC (BLDC) Motor Control Reference Platform (MCRP) that allows engineers to quickly bring the latest motor control technology to appliances, power-tools, fans, pumps, and many other products, while at the same time providing the performance, reliability and power efficiency needed in these systems. At the heart of the reference platform is an R8C/Tiny microcontroller (MCU) that can handle different BLDC motor control algorithms to meet the three primary requirements for motor control applications: cost, performance and flexibility.

R8C/25-based brushless DC (BLDC) Motor Control Reference Platform

Ritesh Tyagi, director of the system LSI business unit at Renesas Technology America pointed out: “Design engineers today are required to complete engineering projects in a limited amount of time. They need to learn about the MCU’s architecture and its development tools, gain experience in motor control technology, develop a hardware platform and then write the software for a new product. Our R8C25 MCRP makes it easier for engineers to quickly turn their ideas into action, while minimizing the risk in the development cycle. This platform provides a complete solution for implementing and developing BLDC motor control by offering both proven hardware and control-algorithm software.”
The R8C/25 based BLDC platform supports four BLDC motor control algorithms:
• 120-degree trapezoidal Hall-sensor based BLDC motor control
• 180-degree sinusoidal Hall-sensor based BLDC motor control
• 120-degree sensorless (back-EMF) based BLDC motor control using external comparators, and
• 120-degree sensorless (back-EMF) based BLDC motor control using the MCU’s on-chip A/D converters.
The hardware platform has many features that allow users to experiment during development and debugging. Various configurations are user selectable via jumpers, and LEDs provide a visual indication of the switching pattern of the pulse-width modulation (PWM) signals driving the motor. Integrated debug and communication interfaces that utilize an isolated E8a debug port and an isolated serial port interface provide communication with the host PC. A graphical user interface (GUI) makes it easy to perform control operations. Also, to ensure safety, the hardware incorporates over-current protection and an emergency shut-off function.
C.G. Masi , senior editor
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