Design Test:DC Locomotive Traction Motor

Overview

This project challenge was Automation of seven Development Test Stands for the world's leading manufacturer of DC Locomotives.

The system conducted various validation and development tests such as but not limited to: Thermal rise-by-resistance, Load Saturation, No Load Core Loss, Short Circuit Core Loss, and Observed Best Commutation (Black Band). The control system for this project had to simultaneously regulate up to five DC generators controlling RPM / Armature Volts, Load Amps / Torque, and Separate Field Amps. Generators were also used for Drive Motor RPM as well as Drive Motor Field with field weakening. This test employed re-circulated power so that the total realized energy cost was less than 15% of the overall power.

Unique Challenges

This system was to replace the obsolete HP 1000 which was in place since 1982. Orchestrating and simultaneously controlling five separate DC generators was by far one of the largest challenges we have faced. There were up to 24 generators to choose from to be distributed to any of seven test stands for any of five functions each.
Regression analysis was used for armature thermal testing and Matrix solutions were required for data reduction of core loss data.