Thien eDrives, a developer of electrical drive systems, is using Matlab and Simulink, from MathWorks, to model, simulate and implement an electric motor control system on TI's C2000 microcontroller unit (MCU). By applying Model-Based Design, Thien eDrives moved rapidly from the first prototype to the final series, reducing development time by 50 per cent.
To develop an electric drive for a fuel cell vehicle compressor unit, including the motor control software, electronics, motor, and other mechanical components, Thien eDrives needed a design approach that enabled early verification of control strategies, code generation, and rapid design iterations throughout the project. Model-Based Design allowed for verification at multiple stages of development, helping produce a high-quality component within a shortened timeframe. Automatic code generation eliminated the time-consuming and error-prone hand-coding process while providing added confidence of compliance with certain MISRA C standards. Using models also simplified design reviews with Thien eDrives customers by eliminating the need for code review-driven processes.
'On past projects, we simulated and verified our designs in Simulink,' said Georg Staffler, development engineer at Thien eDrives. 'For this project, we adopted automatic code generation, which enabled us to complete the compressor project twice as fast as a similar project that applied Model-Based Design with hand coding. Code generation resulted in fewer bugs, better quality, and faster iterations, and it enabled a modular approach that facilitated model reuse across projects.'
