Permanent Magnetic Synchronous Motor (PMSM) Model Development

The Advanced Air Transport Technology (AATT) Project seeks to enhance the capabilities of fixed-wing subsonic transport through improved energy efficiency and environmental compatibility. One element of this effort is the use of high efficiency PMSM systems. Understanding the behavior and limitations of the se motors allows the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to collaborate with and inform its partners worldwide. PMSM modeling is achieved using MATLAB®-Simulink® (The Math Works, Inc., Natick, Massachusetts). Through the analysis of an existing high-fidelity NASA Electrical Aircraft Testbed (NEAT) model, simplified models of varying fidelity can be developed with the goal of building a PMSM model capable of running in real-time for use in a piloted simulation environment. By utilizing system identification methods, it has been demonstrated that internal electrical components like the inverter can be represented by a simple variable gain thus greatly reducing the required simulation step size and subsequently decreasing model run-time by multiple orders of magnitude