Proceedings of 2013 2nd International Conference on Advances in Electrical Engineering (ICAEE 2013)

19-21 December, 2013, Dhaka, Bangladesh

Design Implementation and Testing of a Three Phase

BLDC Motor Controller
Rubayet Hosen, Khosru M. Salim
EEE Department, Independent University Bangladesh
Dhaka, Bangladesh
E-mail: rubayet_iub_ctg@yahoo.com, khosrumdsalim@yahoo.com

Abstract—This paper intends to develop a three phase Y- functioning in these applications. These loops are torque
connected Brushless DC (BLDC) motor controller by using low control loop, speed control loop and position control loop.
cost PIC 18f4431 microcontroller. Unlike a brushed DC motor, Computer Numeric Controlled (CNC) machines are a good
the commutation of a BLDC motor is controlled electronically. example. The construction of BLDC is very similar to the
To rotate the BLDC motor, the stator windings should be AC motor, known as the permanent magnet synchronous
energized in a sequence so it is important to know the rotor motor. BLDC motors are a type of synchronous motor. This
position in order to understand which winding will be means the magnetic field generated by the stator and the
energized following the energizing sequence. BLDC motor in magnetic field generated by the rotor rotates at the same
this study has three Hall effect sensors embedded into the
frequency. BLDC motors do not experience the “slip” that is
stator on the non-driving end of the motor to know the rotor
position. The output of the three Hall effect sensors are feed to
normally seen in induction motors [1].
the PIC18F4431 microcontroller for generating six PWM
signals with a predefined frequency where the required PWM II. METHOD
is active and others are inactive. This motor has been tested In past few years, many researchers have done their
using 35V power supply with a satisfactory result.
research on Brushless DC Motor and its control technique
Keywords— BLDC motor; Three phase BLDC motor control; design. These designs are based on the rotor position of
Pulse width modulation; PIC microcontroller Brushless DC motor. This control technique is done by using
sensors like hall sensors or optical sensors to detect position
of the rotor. But it can be driven also without any position
I. INTRODUCTION (Heading 1) detection by sensors. The terminal voltages on the stator
windings of each phase are controlled by the power
electronic switches. Two phases are conducting at any
In recent years, Brushless Direct current (BLDC) motors instant. For conduction of two phases at a time, electronic
have achieved rapid popularity. BLDC motors are used in switching is needed and speed of motor can be varied by
industries such as appliances, automotive, consumer, varying the switching speed. In 2004 Microchip released the
medical, industrial automation equipment and PIC18F4431 microcontroller for controlling 3-phase
instrumentation. They are more reliable and can be used in synchronous motors which fulfills the objectives of the
poor environmental conditions. Unlike brushed motors as current research. PIC18F4431 microcontroller has
these motors have no chance of sparking, makes them better Capture/Compare/PWM modules and also Power Control
suited to environments with volatile chemicals and fuels. Pulse Width Modulation (PCPWM) Module. PCPWM
BLDC motor control can be categorized into three major module can generate 8 PWM signals whereas this the
types: objective of this work is to generate 3 phase PWM signal for
controlling the BLDC Motor with sensor to detect the rotor
 Constant load
position. To control the 3-phase BLDC Motor a 3-phase
 Varying loads Inverter Bridge is needed which consists of 6 IGBTs driven
with 6 opt couplers. The driving sequences of the 3 phase
 Positioning applications BLDC motor are produced by PIC18F4431 on PWM0-
In constant load applications, variable speed is more PWM5 pins to gate drivers of IGBTS. So 6 PWM signals
important than keeping the accuracy of the speed at a set using a single low cost microcontroller make this project
speed. These applications are fans, pumps and blowers. The more efficient [2].
load on motor varies over a speed range in varying load The main goal of this project is to construct a brushless
application. Home applications like washers and dryers, DC motor controller to control the speed and the rotating
automotive applications like fuel pump control, electronic direction of a BLDC motor. PIC 18f4431 microcontroller is
steering control, engine control and electric vehicle control used to generate the PWM (Pulse Width Modulation) signal
are very good examples. Most of the industrial and with accordance to the output of the Hall Effect sensor to
automation types of application come under positioning rotate the BLDC motor. The Hall Effect sensor is used to
applications. Three control loops are simultaneously

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determine the position of rotor. The width of the PWM
signals is controlled by a potentiometer used in that
microcontroller. Motor speed is controlled by generating
PWM signal with variable pulse width in a fixed particular
frequency. Designing a controller in such a manner will
make it usable for any practical application.

III. CONTROL CIRCUIT OF BLDC MOTOR

Fig 1. shows the overall control circuit diagram of BLDC
controller. The base or gate drive circuit is shown as block,
the function and necessity of the driver circuit will be
described later. Here the electric circuit of a star connected
BLDC motor is shown in right side of this overall control
circuit. A PIC18f4431 microcontroller is used to generate the
PWM signals according to the hall sensors input. The hall
sensor signals are feed to microcontroller to know the current
rotor position. A REF symbol is shown in AN0 point which Fig 2 Current flow of directions in different sequences
is actually a potentiometer used to control the speed of the
motor. The main theme of speed control is to generate IV. IMPLEMENTATION OF PWM USING
variable duty cycles PWM signals for changing motor speed. PIC18F4431
So the potentiometer is basically used to complete 10bit
ADC which value will determine the duty cycle of the PWM. PIC18 microcontroller offers high computational
A FWD/REV button is used to select the rotational direction performance at economical price and with the addition of
of BLDC motor. In order to select direction bit the highly enhanced flash program memory accompanied by
potentiometer as well as ADC value has to set minimum high-speed 10-bit A/D converter. On top of these features,
which makes the PWM duty cycle 0 which in turn makes the PIC 18f4431 introduces 14-bit resolution power control
motor speed to 0. Pressing reset button then will increase PWM module (PCPWM) with programmable dead-time
ADC value that can be measured by a potentiometer after the insertion which is extremely helpful for power control
motor starts rotating and required direction is achieved. application [4].
BLDC motors are electronically commutated. Each A code is written in C programming language to develop
commutation sequence has two of three phases connected the software using CSC C compiler [5]. The whole process is
across the power supply and the third phase is left open. summarized by the flow chart below (Fig 3). A brief
Using PWMs, the voltage supplied across the windings can description of generating PWM signal is also stated below.
be controlled by varying the frequency, thus controlling the
speed. The PWM outputs from the PIC18F4431 control the A. Set Direction Bit
power switches, Q0 to Q5. A matching driver circuit is used
This is the main function of our program after entering
for supplying the required gate current drive for the power
this function which initially checks the command of
switches. A sequence table is entered in the program
direction. In the hardware part an on-off switch is used to
memory [3].
determine the direction. Switch is ON direction means
forward and vice versa.

B. Flow Chart

Fig 1 Control block diagram for controlling a BLDC

motor

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 C. PWM signals and Dead Time
In power electronics pulse width modulation (PWM) is
an operation performed on “raw” voltage and current
waveforms to shape their spectra in a way beneficial to the
application under consideration. Spectra shaping typically
mean the creation of a “dead band” between wanted and
unwanted spectra components. For a given switching
frequency it is desirable that the dead band be as wide as
possible [6]. The powers of PWM0 to PWM5 are on
whereas PWM6 and PWM7 are off. The clock of power
PWM is set in four divisions where in free running mode
post scale is 1. Here dead time is 0 as complementary mode
has not been used. Hence interrupt is enabled globally also
with PWM time base interrupts.
PWM0 to PWM5 is override so that the active or inactive
state of PWM will determine by OVDCOND register. Then
there is a while loop which is build for read 10 bit ADC.
According to ADC the PWM duty cycle will set. This block
calculates and set the duty cycle of PWM0, PWM2, and
PWM4. PWM1 duty cycle is equal to PWM0, PWM3 duty
cycle is equal to PWM2, and PWM5 duty cycle is equal to
PWM4. The processor will interrupt from this while loop
and after complete its task processor returns to this while
loop. Also whenever the ADC value is changed processor
come to while loop and set PWM duty cycle. This function
will continue interrupt and rotating BLDC motor so that it
will never stop or come out from while loop. By the process
described above the program will continue to generate
sequences to rotate BLDC motor.

D. Analoge to Digita (ADC)l Module

Analog pin is varied between 0V to 5V and the

corresponding digital value, which is obtained by ADC
(Analog to Digital Conversion). ADC is initialized 10 bit
binary module and pin A0 of port A is initialized as analog
input channel. ADC mode is set as continuous that will
synchronous with PCPWM. ADC clock is set as internal
with ADC channel set in channel 0 along with AN0.

E. Interrupt Service Routine

This is a PWM time based interrupt function. When a
full cycle of PWM signals is completed then the processor
will come to this interrupt function. This function checks
whether the motor is commanded to rotate forward or
reverse direction. According to the direction it calls another
function to know the rotor position at this moment. It gets a
value from a variable which determines the input state in
C2, C1 and C0 pin of microcontroller. The Hall effect
sensor outputs are connected to C2, C1 and C0 pins. Input
stage of C2, C1 and C0 pins as well as outputs of Hall effect
sensors determine the position of rotor. This value is set to
OVDCOND. OVDCONS is always zero to get PWM as
Fig 3 Flow chart of the code
shown in figure 3.8. After completing its task it returns that
block from which it interrupts. During every complete of a
full cycle PWM it comes this time based interrupt function

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and check the rotor position on that moment then set the input. Those six ac outputs are rectified by signal diode and
OVDCOND and OVDCONS. In fig 4 shows the effect of then filtered which produces six isolated dc power. The
resistor OVDCONd OVDCONS on PWM module. primary ac input of that center tapped transformer comes
from a push pull inverter. A push pull inverter is used to
generate ac from dc power and a SG3525IC is used to
provide the switching sequence for transistor base of push
pull inverter. This ac is feed the isolated power supply
generator module.

Fig 5. BLDC motor controller

Fig 4. Effect of OVDCOND OVDCONS on PWM module In Fig 6 shows the full experimental setup that consists of
four main parts: 12V DC power supply for controller, 35V
DC power supply for motor which is connected to IGBT
V. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP module, controller module, and BLDC motor. A DC power
In order to test the BLDC motor controller its is used to supply 12V DC power for controller. A
necessary to have a setup. As referred by Fig- 5 the transformer, KBU1010 rectifier IC and a 50V 1000uF
controller circuit consists of PIC18f4431 module, IGBT capacitor is used to produce 35V dc voltage from 220V AC
module, gate drive module, an isolated power supply outlets. Then this 35V DC is feed to the IGBT module of
generator module for six gate driver, push pull inverter the controller. BLDC motor used here has a rated voltage of
module, and SG3525IC. PIC18f4431microcontroller is used 48V but it is tested for 35V just to keep the supply voltage
to generate six PWM signal to operate six IGBTs. It takes less than rated voltage. Finally an ammeter in series with
the Hall effect sensor output as an input to know the rotor 35V supply is used to measure the supply current.
position. It also takes the output voltage of a potentiometer
as a speed reference for BLDC motor and an On-Off switch
as a direction bit. So the special task of PIC microcontroller
is to generate six PWM signals according to rotor position
of BLDC which will energized its pole and helps the BLDC
motor to rotate. IGBT module is used for switching purpose.
Six PWM signals drive six IGBTS gate through gate drive
circuit and confirm the required pole is connected to +35V
dc, -35V dc or off to rotate BLDC. The gate drive module is
used to drive the IGBT using PWM signals generated from
microcontroller. The gate drive circuit does two things:
signals isolation and provide the voltage required by the
IGBT gates. The microcontroller output is 5V but the IGBT
gates need 18V to operate. So gate drive convert 5V signal
to 18V signal with isolated reference [7]. That’s why each Fig 6. Experimental setup
gate drive circuit requires isolate power supply. The isolated
power is used to generate six isolated dc power for the six
gate drivers. Hence a center tapped transformer is used to
generate six secondary ac outputs from one primary ac

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 VI. RESULT varying duty cycle of the PWM and different direction by
Both simulated PWM output and the controller PWM output using direction bit selection.
from the PIC Microcontroller are compared, and it is found REFERENCES
that the hardware output is almost close to simulated output.
 Yedamale, P. (2003). Brushless DC (BLDC) Motor Fundamentals.
Microchip Technology Inc.
 MICROCHIP. (2002). Brushless DC Motor Control Made Easy.
Michrochip Techonology Inc.

 Yedamale, P. (2004). Brushless DC Motor Control Using

PIC18FXX31 MCUs. Microchip Technology Inc.
 MICROCHIP. (2003). PIC18F2331/2431/4331/4431 Data Sheet.
Michrochip Techonology Inc.

 CCS. (2013). PCW GETTING STARTED. Custom Computer

Services, Inc.
 S. R. Bowes, M. J. Mount, “Microprocessor Control of PWM
Inverter”, IEEE Proceedings, vol. 128, November 1981
 Rashid, Muhammad H. Power Electronics-circuits, design and
application. 2007.

Fig 7. PWM output with sensor input in Proteus

Fig 8. PWM output in Oscilloscope

VII. CONCLUSION

In this work, a BLDC motor speed controller has been

constructed along with rotating direction controller. The
required phase sequence to rotate the BLDC motor is
generated by using the output of the Hall effect sensor
which is embedded with the stator of that BLDC motor.
HSADC (High speed ADC) module used to get the value of
the PWM duty cycle which are very accurate and can
operate without any acquisition delay. PCPWM module
makes the pulse generation for each sequence of the motor
much easier.
The laboratory test result confirms that the XM8-12050WX
model BLDC motor is operated at different speed by

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