High Performance FOC for Induction Motors with Low Cost ATSAM3X8E Microcontroller

In this paper the Authors present the Arduino Due board application for an induction motor field oriented control (FOC) algorithm. The low cost Arduino Due board is equipped with a ATSAM3X8E microcontroller that performs the algorithm calculation, data processing, current signals and speed/position data acquisition. The control algorithm has been developed with the help of the open source Arduino integrated development environment, whereas a user friendly control interface, used to manage the speed or position set point, has been developed in Java language by means of an other open source software, namely, Processing. An experimental test bed has been set up in order to validate the FOC system and to evaluate the Arduino Due performance. The test results are shown, demonstrating that low cost microcontroller boards can be used successfully for the implementation of high performance electrical drives in industrial, automotive as well as in research applications.