This thesis deals withmodeling and control of an electric drive equipped with a permanentmagnet assisted synchronous reluctance (PMSynRel) machine for a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle application.

In the first part of the thesis, a special use of the PMSynRel machine in consideration, known as an integrated charger concept, is investigated. The integrated charger feature allows using the PMSynRel machine as a part of the vehicle’s on-board charging system when charging the battery from the grid. A finite-element based analysis is performed providing important insights into the machine operation during the charging process. Dynamic models are developed that facilitate the controller development and the estimation of the efficiency during charging.

In the second part of the thesis, position sensorless control of the PMSynRel drive when applied in an automotive application is considered and analyzed thoroughly. First, a fundamental-excitation based rotor-position estimation technique is investigated. The study shows that the impact of current dynamics on the resulting torque dynamics has to be considered in some very demanding applications. Second, focus is put on signalinjection based sensorless control methods. Impacts of nonlinearities, such as magnetic saturation, cross-saturation and inductance spatial harmonics, on sensorless control performance are investigated and methods to improve the sensorless control quality are summarized and presented. An approach to determine the feasible region for operating sensorless at low-speeds without directly measuring the differential inductances is proposed. For the PMSynRel drive in consideration, the achievable maximum torque is limited when operating sensorless following the maximum-torque-per-ampere (MTPA) current reference trajectory at low-speeds. An optimization approach is therefore proposed which extends the output torque when operating sensorless while still maintaining a relatively high efficiency. To initialize the sensorless control correctly from standstill, the impact of the saturated magnetic bridges in the rotor is also investigated.

Finally, torsional drive-train oscillations and active damping schemes are considered. An off-vehicle setup for implementing and evaluating different active damping schemes is proposed. Of particular interest for sensorless operation in automotive applications, the impact of slow speed estimation on the possibility to achieve good active damping control is investigated and a design approach that allows the implementation of an active damping scheme using estimated speed is suggested.