Title: Study on radiation induced performance degradation of BLDC motor in robot servo systems

Authors: Shimeng Li; Yuan F. Zheng; Jie Qiu; Adib Samin; Lei Cao

Addresses: Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, The Ohio State University, 2015 Neil Avenue, Columbus, Ohio 43210, USA ' Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, The Ohio State University, 2015 Neil Avenue, Columbus, Ohio 43210, USA ' Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, The Ohio State University, 201 W. 19th Avenue, Columbus, Ohio 43210, USA ' Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, The Ohio State University, 201 W. 19th Avenue, Columbus, Ohio 43210, USA ' Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, The Ohio State University, 201 W. 19th Avenue, Columbus, Ohio 43210, USA

Abstract: Humanoid robots have great potential in applications in organically dangerous environments, for example, in the radiation environments. However, the radiation damage on robot components except for electronic circuits has not been well studied. Our study in this paper is the first on the radiation induced performance degradation of the brushless DC (BLDC) motor in the robot servo systems. Based on the fact that radiation causes NdFeB magnet demagnetisation, we analyse how this demagnetisation would affect the BLDC motor performance by establishing a model introducing the demagnetisation factor into the electromagnetic model of the BLDC motor, and simulated the motor operation under open loop PWM control in MATLAB. The result shows that the radiation demagnetised BLDC motor will decrease in power, lose controllability, and even quit working by a 'magnetic-trap' jerking effect.

Keywords: BLDC motors; NdFeB magnets; demagnetisation; radiation damage; robot servo systems; radiation induced degradation; humanoid robots; brushless DC motors; robot components; electromagnetic models; modelling; simulation; open loop PWM control; pulse width modulation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMA.2015.075962

International Journal of Mechatronics and Automation, 2015 Vol.5 No.2/3, pp.154 - 162

Received: 16 Sep 2015
Accepted: 24 Nov 2015
Published online: 18 Apr 2016 *

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