For days I've been trying to get a BLDC motor with hall sensors (out of a 8.5 inch wheeled hoverboard) to run with the SOLO MINI controller. But I can't get it rotating.
What works with no problems:
- The communication with the SOLO terminal
- Reading and writing all values with my own software through USB
- Motor Identification (the motor sounds for 1 second like 50Hz)
- Hall Sensors Calibration (the motor slowly makes a quarter turn in increments)
What I tried in digital mode using hall sensors and as well sensorless:
- All six ways to connect the motor wires
- Speed Mode holds the axle strongly in one position. Writing the Speed-Ref will not cause any movement
- Tourque Mode holds the axle in one position, but not very strong
I need ideas on how to proceed.
Many thanks
Hi @rainersolo,
All six ways to connect the motor wires
1- Do you confirm that each time you change the Motor's wiring you do the Calibration again like in the video below? ( each wiring will result in different calibration values that has to be explicitly checked both with Torque and Speed modes operations)
2- Do you confirm that you see the Saw-Tooth shaped signal for the Angle as stated in the Article below while you turn the Motor by hand manually?
3- it seems from your Motion Terminal screen that the current limit is very low, are you sure the 2 Amps are enough for your motor to move? what's the maximum current consumption of your motor?
4- After the calibration is done, what values do you put for the Torque reference to check the motion of the Motor?
6- I see you put the number of poles of your motor as 15, so are you sure it's correct? ( number of Motor's poles on a BLDC is the number of magnets on the rotor, please verify that), if the number of poles is not set correctly, the calibration values will not be valid.
Let me know about the answers and your verifications.
Regards
Milad
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Hi, thank you for your quick reply.
I tried to do all the test again, starting with the Sensor Calibration.
Now I'm very confused about the Motion Terminal Performace Mode diagram:
- Turning the Motor CCW by hand shows rising ramps.
- During the Sensor Calibration, which turns CCW as well, the diagram shows falling ramps.
Please explain me the behavior before I continue.
3) 2A is fine because there is no load and the Motor turn strongly during Sensor Calibration.
6) 15 pols is what I find out with my own motor test and is confirmed in the attached datasheet of the motor
Regards
Rainer
Hi @rainersolo ,
15 pols is what I find out with my own motor test and is confirmed in the attached datasheet of the motor
the datasheet is mentioning 15 pairs of poles, which means your motor has 30 poles ( #Poles = #Pole-pairs *2), so please put the number of poles as 30 and redo the calibration for all the 6 combinations, hopefully, this time it will work.
- During the Sensor Calibration, which turns CCW as well, the diagram shows falling ramps.
it seems the sensor connection is Ok, so most probably the issue was the number of poles, we can check this deeper if the issue didn't get solved by increasing the Pole counts to 30.
Please check this and let me know about the progress.
Regards
Milad
If you found the answers helpful and you could solve your problems, please kindly verify here to help others in the future.
Hi, the number of poles / pol-pairs can't be the reason for not turning in speed and tourque mode.
It is important for the RPM calculation.
By the way, I set the configuration to 15 pol-pairs, because the value "1" is selectable.
But there must be at least 1 south and 1 north pol = 1 pol-pair !
I think it's more likely a SW problem, because the motor rotates correctly during the sensor calibration.
Hi @rainersolo,
The number of Poles is directly related to the value computed for calibration ( I say it as the person who wrote the code for this part 😉 ), if the number of poles is not correct, the value computed for the calibration will be wrong and subsequently, the motor will not turn, of course, wrong pole counts will affect the speed computation, but firstly it will affect the calibration.
so please put the pole counts as 30 and with a very high chance in one combination of motor wirings after the calibration, the motor will start to spin and be controlled both in torque and speed as well as position mode.
Please keep me posted on that.
Regards
Milad
If you found the answers helpful and you could solve your problems, please kindly verify here to help others in the future.
Hi,
a small step forward:
I set the no of poles to 30 and calibrate motor + sensors.
In torgue mode now the motor rotate CW as well CCW as expected.
Increasing the "Torque Referenz" increases the speed/torque.
Changing "Torque Constant [N*m/A]" makes no difference.
In speed mode the wheel shakes powerful forward backward !
Changing the "Speed Controller Kp" and "KI" makes no difference.
Which parameter I have to change ?
Best Regard
Rainer
Hi @rainersolo,
Great.
Changing "Torque Constant [N*m/A]" makes no difference.
This parameter is actually not used by SOLO internally, it's only for monitoring purposes in the Motion terminal, so if you put any value other than 1, the Iq plot in the motion terminal will turn into Torque just in case you want to observe the torque instead of Iq ( torque = Iq x torque constant)
In speed mode the wheel shakes powerful forward backward !
- Have you tried all the 6 combinations of motor wirings? it's better you test all the 6, and see which one works both in Torque and speed mode ( each time you change the motor's wiring you need to recalibrate the Hall sensor first)
- can I have a view of your motion terminal and the parameters you set?
Regards
Milad
If you found the answers helpful and you could solve your problems, please kindly verify here to help others in the future.
