Electric motor control apparatus

• US 7,071,639 B2
• Filed: 10/25/2005
• Issued: 07/04/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 11/04/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Honda Motor Co., Ltd. (Honda Motor Company)
• Original Assignee: Honda Motor Co., Ltd. (Honda Motor Company)
• Inventors: Urushihara, Keisuke, Ochiai, Shinobu
• Primary Examiner(s): Leykin, Rita
• Application Number:
  US11/257,308
• Publication Number:
  US 20060091835A1
• Time in Patent Office: 252 Days
• Field of Search: 318/139, 318/140, 318/800, 318/801, 320/137, 320/127
• US Class Current: 318/139
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 15/08 using pulses
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 10/64 Electric machine technologies in electromobility

Abstract

An electric motor control apparatus suppressing power loss caused by driving an electric motor acting as a motor with a generated output of an electric motor acting as a generator. The electric motor control apparatus comprises a PAM controlled motor selecting unit (53) for determining which of “control pattern 1” and “control pattern 2” should be executed by comparison in total power loss, where a voltage control unit on the power generation side (51) performs voltage transformation with a PWM control in a first inverter (30) and generates a drive voltage for a second electric motor (12) with a PAM control in a second inverter (31) in the control pattern 1 and a voltage control unit on the driving side (52) outputs a rectified voltage from a generated voltage of a first electric motor (6) without voltage transformation in the first inverter (30) and generates a drive voltage for the second electric motor (12) with a PWM control in the second inverter (31) in the control pattern 2.

Claims

1. An electric motor control apparatus, comprising:

at least two electric motors acting as a motor and a generator;

a battery;

an inverter for generating a drive voltage of the electric motor from an input DC voltage and outputting the drive voltage when the electric motor acts as the motor and converting a generated voltage of the electric motor to a DC voltage and outputting the DC voltage when the electric motor acts as the generator, the inverter being connected between each of the electric motors and the battery;

a voltage transformation control unit for performing a PWM control with an ON-OFF control action of a switching element forming an inverter connected to the electric motor activated as the motor to transform the drive voltage for the electric motor activated as the motor from the inverter, and for performing a PWM control with an ON-OFF control action of a switching element forming an inverter connected to the electric motor activated as the generator to transform the generated voltage of the electric motor activated as the generator;

a DC—

DC converter for transforming an I/O voltage between the battery and each of the inverters, the DC—

DC converter being connected to the battery; and

under conditions where at least one of the electric motors acting as the motor is selected as a PAM controlled motor and the inverter connected to the PAM controlled motor is placed in a state to generate a drive voltage without voltage transformation using the voltage transformation control unit,

a voltage control unit on the power generation side for transforming the output voltage of the inverter connected to the electric motor acting as the generator using the voltage transformation control unit, and transforming the output voltage of the DC—

DC converter in such a way as to input a DC voltage corresponding to a target output of the PAM controlled motor to the inverter connected to the PAM controlled motor.

2. The electric motor control apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising,

under conditions where at least one of the electric motors acting as the generator is selected as a PAM controlled motor and the inverter connected to the PAM controlled motor is placed in a state to output a DC voltage without voltage transformation using the voltage transformation control unit,

a voltage control unit on the driving side for transforming the output voltage of the DC—

DC converter to a level which allows a generation of a drive voltage corresponding to a target output of the electric motor acting as the motor with the inverter connected to the electric motor acting as the motor and for performing the voltage transformation using the voltage transformation control unit in such a way as to generate the drive voltage corresponding to the target output with the inverter connected to the electric motor acting as the motor.

3. The electric motor control apparatus according to claim 2, further comprising:

a PAM controlled motor selecting unit for determining an electric motor to be selected as a PAM controlled motor by comparison between first total power loss including the total amount of power loss in each inverter when the voltage control unit on the power generation side performed the voltage transformation control with the electric motor acting as the motor being used as the PAM controlled motor, and second total power loss including the total amount of power loss in each inverter when the voltage control unit on the driving side performed the voltage transformation control with the electric motor acting as the generator being used as the PAM controlled motor.

4. The electric motor control apparatus according to claim 3, wherein the first total power loss and the second total power loss each include power loss in the DC—

DC converter.

5. An electric motor control apparatus, comprising:

at least two electric motors acting as a motor and a generator;

a battery;

an inverter for generating a drive voltage of the electric motor from an input DC voltage and outputting the drive voltage when the electric motor acts as the motor, and converting a generated voltage of the electric motor to a DC voltage and outputting the DC voltage when the electric motor acts as the generator, the inverter being connected between each of the electric motors and the battery;

a voltage transformation control unit for performing a PWM control with an ON-OFF control action of a switching element forming an inverter connected to the electric motor activated as the motor to transform the drive voltage for the electric motor activated as the motor from the inverter, and for performing a PWM control with an ON-OFF control action of a switching element forming an inverter connected to the electric motor activated as the generator to transform the generated voltage of the electric motor activated as the generator;

a DC—

DC converter for transforming an I/O voltage between the battery and each of the inverters, the DC—

DC converter being connected to the battery; and

under conditions where at least one of the electric motors acting as the generator is selected as a PAM controlled motor and the inverter connected to the PAM controlled motor is placed in a state to output a DC voltage without voltage transformation using the voltage transformation control unit,

a voltage control unit on the driving side for transforming the output voltage of the DC—

DC converter to a level which allows a generation of a drive voltage corresponding to a target output of the electric motor acting as the motor with the inverter connected to the electric motor acting as the motor, and performing the voltage transformation using the voltage transformation control unit in such a way as to generate the drive voltage corresponding to the target output with the inverter connected to the electric motor acting as the motor.

6. An electric motor control apparatus, comprising:

at least two electric motors acting as a motor and a generator;

an inverter for generating a drive voltage of the electric motor from an input DC voltage and outputting the drive voltage when the electric motor acts as the motor, and converting a generated voltage of the electric motor to a DC voltage and outputting the DC voltage when the electric motor acts as the generator, the inverter being connected between the electric motors;

a voltage transformation control unit for performing a PWM control with an ON-OFF control action of a switching element forming an inverter connected to the electric motor activated as the motor to transform the drive voltage for the electric motor activated as the motor from the inverter, and for performing a PWM control with an ON-OFF control action of a switching element forming an inverter connected to the electric motor activated as the generator to transform the generated voltage of the electric motor activated as the generator; and

under conditions where at least one of the electric motors acting as the motor is selected as a PAM controlled motor and the inverter connected to the PAM controlled motor is placed in a state to generate a drive voltage without voltage transformation with the PWM control,

a voltage control unit on the power generation side for transforming the output voltage of the inverter connected to the electric motor acting as the generator with the voltage transformation control unit in such a way as to input a DC voltage corresponding to a target output of a PAM controlled motor to the inverter connected to the PAM controlled motor.

7. The electric motor control apparatus according to claim 6, further comprising, under conditions where at least one of the electric motors acting as the motor is selected as a PAM controlled motor and the inverter connected to the PAM controlled motor is placed in a state to output a DC voltage without voltage transformation using the voltage transformation control unit, a voltage control unit on the driving side for performing voltage transformation using the voltage transformation control unit in such a way as to generate a drive voltage corresponding to a target output of the electric motor acting as the motor with the inverter connected to the electric motor acting as the motor.

8. The electric motor control apparatus according to claim 7, further comprising a PAM controlled motor selecting unit for determining an electric motor to be selected as a PAM controlled motor by comparison between first total power loss including the total amount of power loss in each inverter when the voltage control unit on the power generation side performed the voltage transformation control with the electric motor acting as the motor being used as the PAM controlled motor, and second total power loss including the total amount of power loss in each inverter when the voltage control unit on the driving side performed the voltage transformation control with the electric motor acting as the generator being used as the PAM controlled motor.

9. An electric motor control apparatus, comprising:

at least two electric motors acting as a motor and a generator;

an inverter for generating a drive voltage of the electric motor from an input DC voltage and outputting the drive voltage when the electric motor acts as the motor and converting a generated voltage of the electric motor to a DC voltage and outputting the DC voltage when the electric motor acts as the generator, the inverter being connected between the electric motors;

a voltage transformation control unit for performing a PWM control with an ON-OFF control action of a switching element forming an inverter connected to the electric motor activated as the motor to transform the drive voltage for the electric motor from the inverter and for performing a PWM control with an ON-OFF control action of a switching element forming an inverter connected to the electric motor activated as the generator to transform the generated voltage of the electric motor; and

under conditions where at least one of the electric motors acting as the generator is selected as a PAM controlled motor and the inverter connected to the PAM controlled motor is placed in a state to output a DC voltage without voltage transformation using the voltage transformation control unit,

a voltage control unit on the driving side for performing the voltage transformation using the voltage transformation control unit in such a way as to generate a drive voltage corresponding to a target output of the electric motor acting as the motor with the inverter connected to the electric motor acting as the motor.