FPGA-based sensorless control of brushless synchronous starter generator at standstill and low speed using high frequency signal injection for an aircraft application

The sensorless control of brushless synchronous starter generator (BSSG) that is widely used in the aeronautics domain is now considered a hot topic following to the success of the electric start-up of the main engine. Therefore, the focus of this paper is the position estimation of the BSSG during the electric start-up of the main engine at low speed and particularly at standstill. This is achieved by injecting a rotating high frequency voltage in the vector control scheme. The theoretical analysis is supported by experimental evidence obtained by using an aeronautic test bench. The sensorless algorithm is implemented on a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) in order to ensure fast computation with an execution time of a few microseconds. Numerous experimental results are given in order to illustrate the efficiency of the used FPGA-based solution at low speed and at standstill to achieve good performance sensorless control of the brushless synchronous starter generator.