160,000-r/min, 2.7-kW Electric Drive ofSupercharger for Automobiles
Toshihiko Noguchi, Senior Member, Yosuke Takata

Yukio Yamashita, and Seiichi Ibaraki

Department of Electric, Electronics, and Information Engineering
Nagaoka University of Technology
1603-1 Kamitomioka, Nagaoka, Niigata 940-2188, Japantnoguchi@vos.nagaokaut.ac.jp

Nagasaki Research & Development Center
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd.
5-717-1 Fukahori, Nagasaki, Nagasaki 851-0392, Japan

Abstract—This paper describes an ultra high-speed permanentmagnet synchronous motor drive for a supercharger of an
automobile internal combustion engine.
Conventional
superchargers are mechanically linked to and driven by theengine to compress vaporized fuel/air mixture to the engine
cylinder. This mechanical linkage does not allow using a highspeed centrifugal compressor, which features higher efficiency
and higher boost pressure than a positive displacement
compressor. However, an ultra high-speed electric drive makes it
possible to use the centrifugal compressor and to improve total
system efficiency and the boost pressure response because of no
mechanical linkage to the engine.
In addition, higher
controllability of the boost pressure can be obtained by theelectric drive of the supercharger, combining power electronics
with the internal combustion engine system. In this paper, a
160,000-r/min, 2.7-kW permanent-magnet synchronous motor
drive is discussed and its experimental test results are presented
to show excellent performances of the proposed system.

This paper focuses on an electric drive of the supercharger
with an ultra high-speed permanent-magnet synchronous motor(PMSM) and the following technical targets are set:

Keywords-supercharger; centrifugal compressor; ultra highspeed permanent magnet synchronous motor; pseudo-currentsource inverter;I.

INTRODUCTION

Automotive superchargers are mechanically linked to aninternal combustion engine with a belt from a crankshaft
through overdrive devices and compress the air flow to theengine cylinder with mechanical power provided by the engine.
Most of conventional superchargers employ a positive
displacement compressor rather than a centrifugal compressor
because of the operating speed restricted by the engine rotation.
The main drawbacks of the positive displacement compressors
are its low-efficiency and low-boost pressure.
Electric drive of the supercharger makes it possible toemploy a centrifugal compressor instead of the positive
displacement compressor because the rotating speed and torqueof the compressor can be controlled independently of themechanical action of the engine. The electrically driven
centrifugal compressor, which is more efficient and provides
higher boost pressure, allows eliminating the mechanicallinkage with the engine and reducing mechanical power loss ofthe engine. Even though electric motor and power converter
losses are taken into account, sufficient improvement of thetotal system efficiency is expected.

1) A quick response of the boost pressure within several
hundred milliseconds from possible low operating speed up to
140,000 r/min.
2) The maximum rotating speed of 160,000 r/min.
3) Size reduction of the motor and the power converter foreasy implementation in automobiles.
In order to overcome the problems to achieve the above
goals, a guideline of designing the ultra high-speed motor andthe power converter is discussed, and experimental test results
are presented, using a developed prototype, in this paper.
II.

ULTRA HIGH-SPEED PERMANENT-MAGNETSYNCHRONOUS MOTOR DESIGN

A. Required Specifications
In order to electrify the supercharger with a centrifugal
compressor, the following specifications are required to design
an ultra high-speed PM motor:
First of all, a load of the motor is assumed to be acentrifugal compressor for a 1.5-2.0-litter gasoline engine. It is
required to accelerate the compressor from a low speed at anengine idling state to 140,000 r/min within several hundred
seconds, which is almost comparable with a response time of
conventional superchargers. In addition to this requirement,
2.0-kW output power is needed to obtain sufficient boostpressure. To satisfy these requirements, double of the output
torque is indispensable during the acceleration, whichcorresponds to the instantaneous maximum power is 4 kW.
TABLE I DESIGN SPECIFICATIONS OF ULTRA HIGH-SPEED PMSM.
Rated power (cont.)

2.0 kW

Rated torque (cont.)

0.136 N/m

Rated speed (cont.)

140,000 r/min

Maximum speed

160,000 r/min

Maximum power

4.0 kW

200-% overload duration

0.5 sThe number of turns per pole is expressed by the following
equation:N=E, ･･････････････････････････････ (1)4.44k d k p φ mwhere E is an induced voltage per pole, k d is a distributed
winding factor, k p is a shot pitch coefficient, and φ m is a totalmagnetic flux. Therefore, the distributed winding factors andthe short pitch coefficients of the three-slot and the six-slot
machines are derived as follows:
k d 3− slot = k d 6 − slot = 1 ; ････････････････････････････ (2)⎛2 π ⎞
k p 3− slot = sin ⎜⎟ = 0.866 ; and ･･･････････････････ (3)⎝3 2⎠⎛1 π ⎞
k p 6 − slot = sin ⎜⎟ = 0.5 . ･････････････････････････ (4)⎝3 2 ⎠As shown in the above equations, the number of turns of
the three-slot machine is 0.58 times of that of the six-slot one.
This fact implies that the space factor of the former is larger
than that of the latter, which leads easy implementation of thestator windings and forced air-cooling through the stator slots.
This feature matches the mechanical configuration of thesupercharger because an air-cooling fan can be mounted on the
opposite side of the supercharger compressor. However, there
is a great concern about spatial harmonics caused by roughly
allocated stator teeth and slots of the three-slot machine. Since
permeance of the three-slot machine detrimentally varies withrespect to radial direction around the rotor, an eddy current loss
possibly appear even on the rotor magnet as well as in thestator iron core. The eddy current loss on the rotor results inconsiderable temperature rise and fatal demagnetization of the
Sm-Co permanent magnet.
Therefore, it is absolutely
necessary to design the optimum shape of the stator teeth andslots to reduce the spatial variation of the permeance.

Eddy-Current loss
in rotor (W)200
Three-slot machineSix-slot machine

150
100
50
0

20

40

60
80
100
× 103 (r/min)
Motor speed

120

20

40

60
80
100
3
Motor speed ×10 (r/min)

120

20

40

60
80 3
100
Motor speed ×10 (r/min)

120

20

40

60
803
100
Motor speed ×10 (r/min)

120

Core loss (W)

200
150
100
50
0
Copper loss (W)B. Discussion on Stator Configuration
Two sorts of the stator structure have been discussed in thedevelopment process of the ultra high-speed PMSM. One is athree-slot stator and the other is a six-slot stator. Both of them
have a same winding scheme and an identical rotor, i.e.,
concentrating windings and a surface permanent-magnet rotor.
Operation characteristics of the both motors are examinedthrough magnetic field analyses and simulations prior to theexperimental tests of the drive. Since the maximum operating
speed of these motors reaches 160,000 r/min, the number ofpoles is two and extremely thin electromagnetic steel plates of
0.1-mm thickness are employed to construct a laminated statoriron core, which effectively reduces the stator iron loss. In
addition, a wide air gap structure is employed to obtain asinusoidal magnetromotive force across the air gap, which ispossible by mounting a highly strong Sm-Co permanent
magnet on the rotor. Furthermore, the wide air gap allows therotor to be reinforced by an alloy sleeve and/or a carbon fiber
against extremely strong centrifugal force.

200
150
100
50
0
400

Total loss (W)TABLE I lists the design specifications of the ultra high-speed
PMSM discussed in this paper.

300
200
100
0

Fig. 1. Loss analysis result of three-slot and six-slot machines.

C. Loss Analysis Results
Loss analyses of the three-slot and the six-slot machines
were conducted, using a boundary element method and a finite
element method. The boundary element method was applied in
the transition part between the stator iron core and the air gap,
while the finite element method was used in other else part.
Fig. 1 shows loss analysis results of the both machines at 2-kW
output power. As can be seen in the figure, the eddy current
loss on the rotor magnet differs between the two motors andthe three-slot machine dissipates the power 5 times of that of
the six-slot machine. This apparent difference is due to thepermeance variation of the three-slot machine as described
before. From this result, it is found that more than 150 W ofthe eddy current loss is dissipated in the three-slot machine at
120,000 r/min, which results in the total loss of 300 W. On theother hand, the iron core loss of the stator does not show
remarkable difference between the two machines. Therefore,
reducing the eddy current loss on the rotor magnet issignificant to prevent detrimental temperature rise that leads
demagnetization of the permanent magnet. In general, rareearth metal permanent magnet such as Sm-Co is endurable
against higher temperature than Nd-Fe-B permanent magnet.
Taking thermal conductivity and capacity of the rotor into
account, the over 150-W rotor loss possibly raise the rotor
temperature over 150 ºC kin the steady state. However,superchargers are required not to rotate continuously but torotate at high speed mainly during acceleration of theAir-gap length

Tooth tip
length14.8

85

Fig. 4. Flux density distribution of three-slot machine.

Fig. 2. Principal dimensions of three-slot machine.

indicates flux density distribution of the three-slot machinewith no modifications in the stator teeth and slots shape. The
flux density in the air-gap is approximately from 0.4 to 0.5 T
on average.

Eddy current loss (W)175
150
Tooth tip length 0.5 (mm)

125

III.
100

Tooth tip length 1.5 (mm)

75
0
2.0

Tooth tip length 3.0 (mm)

2.5

3.0

3.5
4.0
4.5
Air-gap length (mm)

5.0

5.5

Fig. 3. Eddy current loss at 140,000-r/min and 2-kW operating condition.

automobiles, hence the rotor temperature rise can be limited
under a safe operating level.
D. Optimization of Stator Teeth and Slots ShapeIn order to reduce the spatial harmonics of the three-slot
machine, the shape of the stator teeth and slots was designed asshown in Fig. 2. In other words, semi-closed slots wereintroduced to the machine to minimize the permeance variationin the direction of rotation. The most important dimensions
that influence the eddy current loss are the air-gap length andthe slot openings.
Fig. 3 represents a relationship between the eddy current
loss on the rotor and the air-gap length at 140,000-r/min and 2kW operating condition. This graph is depicted, taking a tooth
top length (slot opening) as a parameter. As can be found in
this analytical result, the longer the tooth tip is (the narrower
the slot opening is), the more eddy current loss can be reduced
regardless of the shorter air-gap length. Since there is atradeoff between the stator iron core loss and the air-gap length,
it is not recommended to shorten the air-gap excessively.
Therefore, 3-mm tooth tip and 4-mm air-gap length wereadopted to the actual prototype motor design for thesupercharger.
Fig. 4 represents an example of magnetic field analysis
result at 120,000 r/min and 2-kW output condition, which

PSEUDO-CURRENT SOURCE INVERTER DRIVE FORULTRA HIGH-SPEED PMSM

In general, a voltage-source PWM inverter is very often
used to operate a PMSM, where a vector control scheme isusually adopted in a microcomputer-based controller that
requires current minor loops, sinusoidal current regulation, andcoordinate transformations. However, the sinusoidal motor
current regulation is hardly possible in the case of ultra highspeed drives because the fundamental frequency of the motor
currents is several kilo-hertz at the base speed or the maximum
operating speed, which does not allow the inverter to performthe pulse width modulation appropriately. The ultra highspeed PMSM for the supercharger described in this paper
reaches 2.3 kHz at the maximum rotating speed of 140, 000
r/min. Therefore, a pseudo-current-source inverter shown in
Fig. 5 is employed to drive the ultra high-speed PMSM.
This inverter features a special circuit topology that can bedivided into two parts, i.e., a current-controlled buck-boost
chopper, and a 120-deg conduction 6-step inverter. The
current-controlled chopper is a substitute for a combination of alarge DC reactor and a phase-controlled thyristor bridge. Since
the switching frequency of the MOSFETs SC1 and SC2 is 48
kHz, the inductance of the DC reactor can dramatically be
reduced, which leads size reduction of the reactor. In addition,
current controllability and response are considerably improvedby the high-switching frequency, compared with theconventional thyristor-based converter. Using the currentcontrolled buck-boost chopper across the DC bus, the motor
current amplitude is regulated by means of a pulse amplitude
modulation (PAM) technique by adjusting the chopper duty
ratio. When the motor is in a motoring mode, the chopper acts
as a buck chopper and can be regarded as a regulated current
source from the inverter. However, at every moment ofcommutation in the inverter, surge voltages appear on the
motor terminals due to the winding inductance of the motor.
These surge voltages are clamped by the DC bus voltage

SC1

LC CT IL

InverterS 1 S2 S3Phase voltages
Vdc
72 V

SC2

C +

PMSM

Motor voltage (V)Buck chopper
D

U V W

1/s

Logic

+
PI
*I

φ
PI
Comparator
and IsolatorLωmthrough a bypass diode of the chopper and body diodes in the
MOSFETs of the inverter. Therefore, it is not necessary to
implement blocking diodes in series with the inverter switching
devices and the power source of the inverter can be regarded asa voltage source just during the commutation rather than the
chopper-controlled current source.
On the other hand, the 6-step inverter with 120-deg
conduction period controls the frequency and the relative phaseof the motor currents. The commutation of the inverter iscarried out on the basis of an e.m.f.-based mechanicalsensorless control algorithm of the PMSM. The 120-deg
conduction pattern is simply generated by using several analogand-logic mixed signal circuits, i.e., a motor terminal voltage
detector, integrators to calculate the flux linkages, a flux signal
isolation circuit composed by photo-couplers and a 120-deg
conduction pattern generator. One of the isolated flux signals
is used to detect the motor speed and is converted to an analog
signal with a F/V conversion circuit. The motor speed
controller consists of an ordinary PI element, which provides acurrent command to the current-controlled buck-boost chopper.
As described above, since the mechanical sensorless control
algorithm of the system is basically requires detection of the
motor back e.m.f., it is impossible to detect the back e.m.f. at astandstill state and is rather difficult to control the motor in a
low-speed range. Therefore, open loop control is applied tostart up the motor until the operating speed reaches 10,000
r/min. While the open loop control is carried out, the 120-deg
conduction pattern is generated with a voltage-controlled
oscillator and the conduction pattern generator described before.
After reaching the speed threshold of 10,000 r/min, the 120deg conduction pattern is switched over to that generated by
the e.m.f.-based circuit.
IV.

COMPUTER SIMULATIONS

Several computer simulations were conducted to examine
the basic operation performances prior to experimental tests.
The test motor has identical specifications as listed in TABLE I

50
0
-50
-100
Time 150 (µs/div)

Fig. 6. Motor voltage and current waveforms at 140,000-r/min and 4-kW
overload condition (simulation result).

Motor voltage (V)Fig. 5. Schematic diagram of Pseudo-current-source inverter.

100

-150

F/V

60
45
30
15
0
-15
-30
-45
-60
Time 150 (µs/div)

150

Motor current (A)

+
-

150
Motor current (A)Integrator

ωm*Time 150 (µs/div)v

S 4 S5 S 6

60
45
30
15
0
-15
-30
-45
-60

100
50
0
-50
-100
-150
Time 150 (µs/div)

Fig. 7. Motor voltage and current waveforms at 160,000-r/min and 2.7-kW
operating condition (simulation result).

and its stator teeth and slots shape is designed to be 3 mm for
tooth tip length and 4 mm for air-gap length, respectively. The
pseudo-current source inverter has a 72-V DC bus voltage andan 80-µH reactor in the chopper.
Fig. 6 shows a simulation result of the operation at a140,000-r/min and 4-kW overload condition. As can be seen inthis figure, the motor current is properly commutated with asix-step conduction waveform, while the terminal voltage
waveform is almost sinusoidal. The surge voltage pulses areobserved at every moment of commutation but are clamped by
the DC bus voltage. Since the clamped voltage restricts adi dt rate during the current commutation, the current
waveform is similar to a trapezoidal one.

Fig. 8. Photograph of supercharger driven by 160,000-r/min, 2-kW PMSM.

Fig. 7 shows another simulation result of the maximum
output operation at the maximum speed of 160,000 r/min. The
restricted di dt rate during the current commutation does notallow the pseudo-current source inverter to output higher peakcurrent and more power to the motor than 75 A and 2.7 kW,
respectively. However, overall feasible operations of the
proposed system are confirmed by the simulation resultspresented here.
V.

EXPERIMENTAL SYSTEM SETUP AND RESULTS

3000
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
0
40

Total power factor

Fig. 9. Photograph of pseudo-current source inverter.

Inverter output power (W)Fig. 10. Motor voltage and current waveforms at 160,000-r/min, 2.7-kW
operating condition (experimental result).

60

80
100
120
140
3
Motor speed (×10 r/min)

160

180

160

180

1.0
0.9
0.8
0.7
0.6
0.5
0.4
0.00
40

60

80

100

120

140

Motor speed (×10 r/min)3

A. Experimental System Setup
A prototype of the ultra high-speed PMSM drive was setup
for experimental tests. The drive satisfies the ratings and thespecifications listed in TABLE I. Fig. 8 shows a photograph ofa test supercharger electrically driven by the 160,000-r/min, 2kW PMSM. As shown in this photograph, the centrifugal
compressor is mounted on one side of the ultra high-speed
PMSM, where an air intake is on the left hand side and thecompressor exhausts through a pipe with an orifice and apressure gauge. A cooling fan is attached on the other side of
the motor and inhales the ambient air into the motor. Fig. 9
indicates a photograph of the pseudo-current source inverter.
The power circuit is entirely composed on a multi-layer printed
circuit board with highly thick copper patterns. This structure
allows the inverter to reduce line inductance as well as line
resistance, which is essential to drive the ultra high-speed
PMSM. In general, since such an ultra high-speed machine as

Fig. 11. Inverter output power and total power factor (experimental result).

described in this paper has an extremely low winding
inductance, e.g., less than 10 µH, it is significant andindispensable to reduce the line inductance in the inverter as
low as possible. In order to reduce the line impedance, In the
prototype, MOSFETs with 60-V and 150-A ratings are
employed and two of them are operated at 48-kHz in the buckboost chopper. Also, the DC bus reactor has a same inductancevalue as that assumed in the simulations.
B. Operating Waveforms and Static Characteristics
Fig. 10 shows voltage and current waveforms of the
prototype ultra high-speed PMSM. The operating speed andthe output power are 160,000 r/min and 2.7 kW, which is
identical with the simulation condition depicted in Fig. 7. As

Particularly, the paper focused on a guideline to design the
motor, using a magnetic field analysis based on boundary andfinite element methods. In addition to the above theoreticalaspect, a three-slot machine prototype was set up to verify
experimentally the operation performances and basic
characteristics of the drive are examined through experimental
tests as well as computer simulations.

Fig. 12. Transient response of compressor pressure and motor current(experimental result).

can be seen in this figure, the 120-deg conduction pattern of the
motor current is distorted due to an improper pattern generationof the controller. One of the reasons for the improper patterngeneration is the surge voltage during current commutation,
which prevents accurate calculation of the flux linkages.
Another reason is impedance drop of the stator windings,
which causes a relative phase error of the 120-deg conduction
pattern with respect to the back e.m.f. Fig. 11 represents theinverter output power and the total power factor. Since theload of the motor is a centrifugal compressor, which is a typical
fluid mechanism, the output power increases as a cubic
polynomial function of the rotating speed. On the other hand,
the total power factor is around 0.5 regardless of the operating
speed or the output power. As pointed out before, the total
power factor is hard to improve because the 120-deg
conduction waveform inherently includes a large amount of
harmonics and is detrimentally affected by the impedance dropof the stator windings. Therefore, compensation of the
impedance drop must be investigated to improve the total
power factor in the future work.
C. Dynamic Response of Supercharger
Fig. 12 shows a dynamic response of supercharger
electrically driven by the prototype PMSM. The figure depicts
compressor boost pressure when the speed command ischanged stepwise from 50,000 r/min to 140,000 r/min, wherethe vertical axis is normalized with a target value of the boostpressure. Although the response can be changed by adjusting
the PI gain of the speed regulator, higher gain to obtain a faster
response makes the mechanical sensorless control unstable.
Therefore, the PI gain was experimentally adjusted not to makethe system unstable but to achieve the fastest response in the
boost pressure. As can be seen in this figure, the response timeof the boost pressure is approximately 0.5 s and this result
surpasses that of the conventional superchargers.

According to the magnetic field analysis result, an optimum
shape of the stator teeth and slots was designed to reduce aneddy current loss on the rotor magnet.
Furthermore,
controllability of the ultra high-speed PMSM with a pseudocurrent source inverter was verified through computer
simulations.
Every simulation result proved excellent
operating characteristics of the proposed system. However,experimental result pointed out some problems on current
waveform generation at a higher current and more power
condition. In such an experimental situation, the 120-deg
conduction pattern is detrimentally distorted due to thesimplified mechanical sensorless control algorithm; hence it isnecessary to improve the algorithm in the future work.
However, the paper demonstrated a continuous operation of
the drive at 160,000-r/min speed and 2.7-kW output andconfirmed an excellent response of the boost pressure with theprototype supercharger, i.e., 0.5 s. Every result proves
feasibility of the proposed system and indicates possibility ofthe electrification of the automobile supercharger.
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VI.

CONCLUSION

This paper described an ultra high-speed permanent magnet
synchronous motor drive applied to automobile superchargers.

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