Cascade Control of PM DC Drives Via Second-Order Sliding-Mode Technique

This paper presents a novel scheme for the speed/position control of permanent-magnet (PM) dc motor drives. A cascade-control scheme, based on multiple instances of a second-order sliding-mode-control (2-SMC) algorithm, is suggested, which provides accurate tracking performance under large uncertainty about the motor and load parameters. The overall control scheme is composed of three main blocks: 1) a 2-SMC-based velocity observer which uses only position measurements; 2) a 2-SMC-based velocity control loop that provides a reference command current; and 3) a 2-SMC-based current control loop generating the reference voltage. The proposed scheme has been implemented and tested experimentally on a commercial PM dc motor drive. The experimental results confirm the precise and robust performance and the ease of tuning and implementation, featured by the proposed scheme.