Microchip adds DSCs and MCUs for motor control
Digital signal controllers (DSCs) and microcontrollers (MCUs) in the Microchip portfolio are supported by design tools, development hardware, a torque-maximising algorithm and a refrigerator compressor reference design to meet increased demand for electric motors in various applications.
The dsPIC33C DSCs are examples. They have a high level of analogue integration to simplify motor control system design while reducing development and bill of materials costs in automotive, industrial, medical and consumer applications. Joe Thomsen, vice president of Microchip’s MCU16 business unit, commented: “Our newly enhanced support ecosystem helps engineers get their designs done faster with the optimum combination of performance, efficiency and reliability.”
Additions to Microchip’s motor control family include: dsPIC® DSCs, the cost-optimised, functional safety-ready dsPIC33CK64MC10x DSCs for field oriented control (FOC). They are supported by motor control plug-in modules (PIMs) for existing motor control development boards and with a new cost-effective, low voltage motor control development board. MPLAB X integrated development environment (IDE) and MPLAB Code Configurator (MCC) support rapid code development, and another product, motorBench development suite provides FOC motor control optimised code generation.
The PIC32MK MCJ and MCM MCUs for FOC are the second-generation 32-bit MCU devices from Microchip. They offer 32-bit floating point and DSP performance with flexible communications options. By sharing analogue features with the dsPIC33CK, they support seamless migration across device classes. These also feature multiple CAN-FD and USB ports.
The MCUs are supported in the MPLAB X IDE with three development hardware options. Software support for the PIC32MK includes a suite of motor control software for sensor and sensorless applications via the MPLAB Harmony v3 Software Framework.
The motorBench development suite, the GUI-based software development tool, version 2.35 shortens the time required to spin a motor using FOC and generates optimised source code customised for a given motor. This release expands dsPIC33CK family support, and adds new features, including an angle track-phase locked loop (AT-PLL) estimator, field weakening, maximum torque per Amp (MTPA) and dead-time compensation.
The zero speed/maximum torque (ZS/MT) algorithm eliminates Hall sensors in applications demanding high torque at standstill or low speeds for low-inductance motors. It supports the dsPIC33 DSCs, SAM and PIC32MK motor control MCUs.
For development, Microchip also offers the dsPIC33CK low voltage motor control development board for the dsPIC33CK family.
Finally, a low-cost, high-efficiency refrigerator compressor reference design has been added to shorten the time to market.
The dsPIC33CK64MC105 DSCs are available in six packages as small as 4.0 x 4.0mm with pin counts from 28 to 48 and memory ranging from 32 to 64kbyte of flash with 8kbyte of RAM. PIC32MK devices are available with memory ranging from 256kbyte to 1Mbyte of flash and 64 to 256kbyte of RAM.
