Toshiba Electronic Devices & Storage Corporation has unveiled the availability of engineering samples for the TB9M030FG, which belongs to the company’s advanced line of SmartMCD™ motor control devices. This high-end IC integrates both MCU and gate driver in one package and uses state-of-the-art sensorless technology to guarantee smooth, low-speed performance for three-phase BLDC motors in automobiles, including electric water pump, oil pump, fan, and blower applications.
Powering Automotive Miniaturization and Efficiency
With the automotive industry undergoing rapid transition towards fully-electrified vehicles, carmakers are tasked with designing solutions that can offer quieter operations, increased efficiency, and smaller dimensions. Considering the increasing complexity of today’s automotive architectures, with multiple ECUs being packed together in ever-smaller spaces, there is an urgent need to minimize the number of components and PCB real estate occupied by them.
Advancing Sensorless Field Oriented Control (FOC)
A primary challenge in automotive motor design is the accurate detection of rotor position at low speeds without the use of bulky position sensors. Toshiba’s new SmartMCD™ utilizes high-performance Sensorless Field Oriented Control (FOC) technology to deliver stable operation starting from zero speed.
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Key technical highlights include:
High-Level Integration: Consists of an MCU based on the Arm® Cortex®-M0 core, flash memory, a three-phase gate driver for N-channel power MOSFETs, and a LIN transceiver.
Vector Engine Hardware: Uses hardware acceleration offered by Toshiba that significantly lowers the burden on the CPU and the software requirements, thus simplifying advanced motor control algorithms.
Whisper-Quiet Operation: Using advanced Toshiba technology and avoiding the typical approach of employing a high-frequency signal injection that produces unwanted harmonics resulting in audible sound, the new device makes sure that the motor is quiet and operates silently-a crucial factor in passenger comfort.
Automotive Quality: Meets all requirements for being rated AEC-Q100 (Grade 0).
Using the sophisticated and highly effective sensorless field-oriented control algorithm in the TB9M030FG, engineers can make their automotive systems more compact, reliable, and quiet while maintaining excellent performance.
