Novel switched reluctance motor drive circuit with voltage boost function without additional reactor

Switched reluctance motor (SRM) is attractive for the driving motor of electric vehicles (EVs) and hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) from the view point which does not use rare-earth materials. However, special drive circuit, which is different from general three-phase inverter used for permanent magnet synchronous motor and induction motor, is required in order to drive SRM. By the way, in some of commercial HEVs, boost chopper combined with three-phase inverter is used in order to apply high voltage to motor windings at high-speed range. In this system, the size of the additional reactor, which is required in boost chopper, is a problem. Then, this paper proposes a novel drive circuit with voltage boost function without additional reactor for SRM. In addition, control scheme and controller configuration for the proposed circuit are described. Moreover, the effectiveness of the proposed circuit is verified by simulation and experimental results.