Performance Analysis of Fuzzy Logic Control and
Six-Pulse Line-Commutated Converter in DC Motor
Drive Application
Zunaib Ali1, Komal Saleem2, Nicholas Christofides1, Abdur Rashid2, Haider Zaman3, Muqadsa Tahir4, and Umair Younas2
1
Frederick University Cyprus (zunaib_91@yahoo.com, n.christofides@frederick.ac.cy),
2
COMSATS Institute of Information Technology Abbottabad, Pakistan. ({komalsaleem; drarashid; umairyounas}@ciit.net.pk )
3
University of Engineering & Technology Peshawar, Abbottabad Campus, Pakistan (hdrzaman@hotmail.com)
4
Queensland University of Technology, Australia (muqadsa.tahir@hdr.qut.edu.au)
Abstract—This paper presents the performance analysis of
six-pulse line commutated converter (LCC) and advanced
control strategy Fuzzy Logic Control (FLC) for speed control
of a dc motor. The speed of motor is maintained at the desired
reference value by adjusting the value of armature current.
The armature current is varied by controlling the firing angle
of LCC. The desired value of reference current is obtained
from the corresponding speed value and is fed to the
controller. The controller takes the measured and reference
value of armature current as an input. The output of the
controller is firing angle. To maintain the motor speed at the
desired value two controllers the FLC and the conventional
Proportional Integral Derivative (PID) controllers are
employed and their performance is compared. The proposed
controllers and power system is implemented in Control
System and SimPowerSystem toolbox of MATLAB. Results of
Computer simulation are described and debated together with
a comparative analysis of the different control schemes. The
simulation results show that the proposed FLC has tracking
ability with better steady state error and transient response
than conventional PID controller. Moreover, the deleterious
effects of converter on input current and power factor are also
discussed.
Index Terms—Line Commutated Converter (LCC), Silicon
Control Rectifier (SCR), distortion factor, displacement
factor, harmonics, DC motor, proportional integral
derivative and fuzzy logic control.
NOMENCLATURE
Moment of inertia
Load torque
Field circuit resistances
Armature circuit resistances
Field circuit inductances
Armature circuit inductances
K Voltage constant
B Viscous friction constant
Back emf of the motor
, Field and armature voltage respectively
, Field and armature current respectively
978-1-4673-7113-1/15/$31.00 ©2015 IEEE
I. INTRODUCTION
In today’s industries motion plays vital part. DC motors
features excellent speed control, efficiently controlled by
motor drives first smoothly to zero, then followed
immediately in opposite direction [1] [2]. DC drives are the
industry’s backbone because of their numerous benefits, like
low cost, reliability, efficient performance, simplicity, and
control advantages. Compared to AC drives for low power
applications, DC drive systems are much cheaper and
compact [3]. DC motors are recognized as speed adjustable
machines which enhance their popularity. Extensive range
of possibilities have been developed for this purpose from
several years. Speed control of AC drive systems are more
expensive and complex. The compatibility of DC motors
with most mechanical loads and their adjustable/controllable
speed/torque characteristics make them superior than
complex AC drives [4].
DC motor applications began to intensify exponentially,
with the progression of high rating solid state switches. In
light of switches controllability of DC drives, two methods
are exploited by taking voltage as an adaptable parameter
[5]. In the first method controlled rectification is used to
vary output voltage from a fixed input AC voltage by
varying firing angle as shown in Fig. 1(a) [3]-[5]. While in
the second technique, DC choppers are used in series with
uncontrolled rectifiers to produce variable DC voltage by
altering duty cycle as depicted in Fig. 1(b) [3]. The first
technique is used in this research.
Conventionally, classical controllers are used for the
speed control of DC motors. Nonetheless, exact plant
mathematical model is required for the execution of
classical control [6]-[7]. In addition, the performance of
classical control is disturbed by thermal variations, motor
saturation and load disturbance which indirect disturb the
machine parameters [8]-[9]. To evade these glitches,
artificial intelligence techniques such as Fuzzy Logic
Controller (FLC) can be used [10]-[11]. FLC has risen as a
standout amongst the most dynamic and productive area for
research exploration, particularly in the domain of industrial . (2)
processes such as DC motor drives [12].
where is back emf of the motor and is represented as
In this research SCR based converters are used to
follows
synthesize variable DC from fixed AC voltage [13]. A new
intelligent technique, rule based Direct FLC is scrutinized as
. (3)
a DC motor speed controller. Additionally, assessment of
simulation results using the proposed technique is compared
with the conventional classical control technique PI. The induced torque in terms of currents and load torque is
The paper is organized as; after the introductory section, given in Eqn. 4 and 5.
mathematical modeling of DC motor is presented in section
II. The working principle of the six-pulse line commutated . (4)
converter is presented in section III. An introduction to FLC ω . (5)
is given in section IV. Section V presents the simulation
results of the proposed controller as compared to PI where, is Moment of inertia, is load torque (N.m),
controller, followed by conclusions. and is field and armature circuit resistances respectively
II. DC MOTOR MODELLING (Ω), and is armature and field circuit inductances (H),
K is voltage constant V⁄A/rad/s), B is viscous friction
The commonly used separately excited DC motors
equivalent circuit is shown in Fig. 2. Because of the constant N. ⁄
and is angular speed rad⁄s .
independent nature of armature current and field current
in separately excited DC motor, at a particular speed, load B. Steady-state Analysis
torque is balanced with induced torque and back For the sake of steady-state analysis, all the derivative
electromotive force is produced. terms must be put equal to zero. The resulting equations for
instantaneous field and armature current, induced torque and
induced power are as below
IA
~
AC
+ . (6)
AC VA M Motor
Supply DC -
. (7)
_ Bω . (8)
. (9)
Fig. 1(a). Controlled rectifier fed motor.
Equation (7) is used to derive the most important relation
of armature voltage and speed of DC motor.

⁄
. (10)

Fig. 1(b). Uncontrolled rectifier followed by DC-DC converter.
A. Transient Analysis
The transient analysis of separately excited DC motor is
derived using Fig.2:
Equation (10) clearly shows direct relation between
speed of motor and armature voltage by keeping field and
armature current constant [14]. In practice, the speed of
motor is controlled by making armature voltage variable. So
the output voltage of three phase SCR bridge is fed to DC
motor and by changing the firing angle the speed is varied.
III. WORKING PRINCIPLE OF SIX PULSE CONVERTER
The schematic diagram for six-pulse three-phase
controlled rectifier is shown in the Fig. 3.

Fig. 2. Separetly excited DC motor.

The instantaneous field and armature current can be

found from the following equations.

. (1) Fig. 3: Six-Pulse controlled rectifier

 The circuit utilizes 3 pairs of silicon controlled wheras the relation of voltage as function of is obtained
rectifiers (SCR) for the purpose of rectification, each pair using Fig.4 as follows:
connected in one leg, that is, , , ( , and , .
The input to rectifier is a three phase supply with sinusoids
√3 sin . (11)
(( , & ) having same magnitude ( ⁄

) and frequency ( ), but there is a phase √

sin .
shift of 120° among three of them. The working standard of
√
cos 2 cos
the circuit is that, the pair of SCR associated between the 3 3 .
lines having most elevated measure of line-to-line voltage √
will start conduction given that the SCR is applied with the cos . (12)
gate signal at that moment i.e. in addition to 0, SCR cos . (13)
also needs a gate signal to turn ON. In order to understand cos . (14)
the working of converter the voltage waveforms for input
and output and also the waveform for input current of the
where is the average value of output DC voltage at
rectifier’s phase ‘a’ is presented in in Fig. 4.
0 and is the average voltage normanilzed with
respect to . The firing angle versus the normalized
output voltage plot is depicted in Fig. 5.

Normalized Average Voltage

0.5

0 Rectification Region Inversion Region

-0.5

-1
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3
α (rad)
Fig. 5. Normalized average voltage as function of

Fig. 4. The 3 line to line voltage waveform , converter output From Fig. 4, it can also be inferred that if goes beyond
3 , the rectified output voltage reaches zero crossing. In
voltage waveform , Phase “ ” current waveform .
the event that extends past 3 i.e. 3, the voltage
Fig. 4 shows that when the value of is between
0 & 3, the line-to-line voltage with highest magnitude is across the load goes through discontinous mode for the case
of resistive load and in the event of an inductive load the
is , with & already conducting. & are already
volatge across it becomes negative. As seen form the
conducting, so by turning ON at delay , the voltage at
rectification region of Fig. 5, by traversing the value of
load will be . It ought to be noticed that continues to
between 0 2, the value of output voltage is varied
appear acrros the load till 3 . Even though after the
between 1 & 0. Similarly, in inversion region, the output
point 3, the highest value of line-to-line voltage is ,
goes from 0 1 as the value of is varied from
the volatge that appears across the load will still be the . LCC is a 2-Quadrant converter, that is,
until is not turned ON. Consequently, when the SCR 2
Rectification region corresponds to operation in
is turned ON, current starts flowing through & and
1 Quadrant and inversion region to that of 4 Quadrant.
automatically switches off i.e. the volatge across the load is
There is an additional issue in utilizing the six-pulse
. It is important to note that, except for the first cycle, at
LCC converter i.e. the deleterious impact of converter on
any time only one SCR is needed to be turned ON. This is
input current, which inturn affects the power factor. The
because, one SCR already continues to conduuct as a result
expression for the input power factor of the motor load
of phase sequence.
(highly inductive) can be derived as:
It can be inferred from Fig. 4 that the pulsating DC has
frequency of 6 , which means that the harmonics are
shifted to higher frequency. Consequently, the shifting of .
harmonics reduces the filtering requirement needed at the . cos
output as compared to e-pulse rectifier [15]-[16]. The DC · ⁄√

voltage at the converter output is a function of firing angle . 0.9 cos (15)
 As indicated by equation (15), the maxximum value of
power factor can be 0.9. It can also be seenn that the power , .
factor is varied from 0.9 to 0 as the value of is varied
form 0 for rectification region and for inversion
i region The second step is adapttation and generation of control
it is varied between 0 0.9. law. With regards adaption define the parameter vector
IV. FUZZY LOGIC CONTROLLEER , , … . The param
meter vector is updated at every
instant of time in accordance with the equation,
This section incorporates the detail off the proposed
adaptive fuzzy logic controller (ADFLC) for the speed
. (16)
control of DC motor. Fuzzy Logic Controoller (FLC) is a
procedure to incorporate human-like intuitioon into a control
Thus the consequents of fuzzy rules are adjusted
framework [17]. The advantages or o FLCs over
according to the Eq. 16. Where 0 is an arbitrary
conventional controllers are that they doo not need an
constant and is the lasst column of positive definite
accurate mathematical model, can handle noon-linearity, and
matrix , satisfying the Lyappnouv matrix equation
they are more robust than conventional nonliinear controllers
[18]. The technique implemented in this papper is Lyapnouv
. (17)
based direct adaptive fuzzy control. In direct adaptive
control, the controller is adjusted directly without
w referring
Where is positive definnite matrix and if the last column
to any plant model. Thus, the indirect step of identifying the
plant is avoided. Instead, the controller adjuustment is made of is obtained using Lyaapnouv equation, the controller
on the basis of an error that rates the t closed-loop becomes asymptotically stablle.
performance [19]. The final control signal that
t is, firing angle, is generated
The design of the proposed ADFLC invvolves two steps, using the following control laaw
that is, (i) rule base generator and (ii) adaption of rules and
generation of control signal as shown in Fig. 6. The rules . (18)
are developed by using Fuzzy membershipp functions and V. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
rule base is formed by combining all the ruules. Finally, the
rules are updated using Lyapnouv candidate function and in- The results of proposed ADFLC
A and the performance of
turn the controller becomes adaptive. The controller takes six-pulse converter is analyzed in MATLAB
four variables as input. SimPowerSystem toolbox. The circuit in power system
1) The armature current consists of DC motor and LC CC six-pulse controlled rectifier.
2) The derivative of Current Similarly, the control circuitt consisting of PI & ADFLC is
3) The error signal developed using the com mponents of Simulink and is
4) The derivative of error signal simulated in combination with
w power system to obtain the
results. For generating the controlled
c pulses to operate the
thyristors of LCC a six-puulse Synchronized Generator is
used, that takes firing anngle as an input. The series
connection of RL and a DC C source (showing back emf) is
employed to model the DC motor.
m The model developed in
MATLAB is shown in the Fiig.7.
In this paper, the arm mature current of the motor is
adjusted to control the speedd of motor. The reference value
of armature current is obtaineed for a desired speed value and
is fed to controller. The conntroller adjusts its parameters to
track the commanded referennce speed value.
Fig. 6. Block diagram of proposed adaptive direct Fuzzyy controller

The first step is to develop rule base gennerator. The first

two inputs , are used for generation of the
rules. Whereas, the other two inputs, , are
used for adaptation and generation of conntrol law. With
regards rules, four fuzzy sets , , , are defined on
and similarly four fuzzy sets , , , for
universe of discourse. The total numbers of o rules that are
formed is 16 and the type of membership functionf used is
triangular. The rule base is represented byy a vector .
The rule of rule base is of the form
Fig .7. Model for speed control of DC
D motor.
 The time is kept constant throughout the simulation to a
value is 0.35 . Fig. 8 shows the time domain trace for
variation in armature current of motor with a varying
reference current . The reference current is step
waveform whose initial value is ‘16’ and at 0.15, it is
subjected to a step change from ‘16’ to ‘26’. Fig. 8 shows
that the proposed ADFLC has tracking ability with better
steady state error and transient response than conventional
PID controller.
Fig. 8. Variation in the armature current to track the desired reference value
Fig. 9. Variation in LCC output voltage to maintain the reference armature
current
Fig. 10. Variation in firing angle alpha for achieving desired reference
current
100
α = π/3
Normalized Harmonic Magnitude
80
60
40
20
0
0 60 120 180 240 300 360 420 480 540 600 660
Frequency Hz
Fig. 11. Frequency domain plot of input current for 3.
The ADFLC is much better in maintaining the motor
current at desired reference value than PID. Initially the
armature current was at zero, but after some time the
reference value reached ‘16’ and current became constant
with fuzzy controller, whereas PID controller doesn’t
respond well in tracking the reference and motor current
continues to oscillate about the reference. At 0.15 the
current is subjected to a step change. It can be inferred from
Fig. 8 that ADFLC quickly updated its parameters and
started to follow the new reference with small steady state
error as compared to PI which is oscillating. The control of
armature current directly regulates the speed of DC motor.
Hence ADFLC is better in speed control than conventional
PID controller. The performance of AFLC and PID is
evaluated on the basis of Integral Absolute Error (IAE) and
Integral Square Error (ISE). Table I in appendix lists the
IAE and ISE for both PI and AFLC. From IAE and ISE it
can be inferred that AFLC performance is better than PID.
The corresponding variation in the firing angle and
output voltage pattern of LCC is shown in Fig. 9 and Fig.
10, respectively. It can be seen that because of oscillations,
the plot of firing angle and that of output voltage is much
more oscillating for PID than the proposed ADFLC
controller.
It can also be concluded from equation (15) that the
input power factor of LCC converter varied by varying the
firing angle . Therefore, the effect of firing angle on
converter’s power factor is also important to analyze. Power
Factor (PF) can be found by calculating Displacement
Factor (DPF) (corresponds to the phase difference between
voltage and input current fundamental component) and
Distortion Factor (DTF) (corresponds to distorted input
current). Fig. 7 contains a power factor block that is used to
compute power factor by calculating the distortion and
displacement factor. The value of DPF and DTF for
different values of is listed in Table II in the appendix.
The frequency domain plot of input current is shown in Fig.
11 for 3.
VI. CONCLUSION
The speed of motor is controlled using the six-pulse line-
commutated converter. The firing angle of converter is
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