Bifurcation analysis of five-phase induction motor drives with third harmonic injection

The interest in variable-speed multiphase induction-motor drives has substantially increased in recent years and novel proposals show good prospects for industrial implementation in high-power applications. The additional degrees of freedom existing in multiphase machines have allowed for new applications with high torque density by current harmonic injection in concentrated winding machines. This paper addresses, for the first time, the bifurcation analysis of a five-phase induction-motor drive when a third harmonic is injected for torque-enhancement purposes. The main focus of this paper is to present a mathematically based study of the nonlinear dynamics of the proposed drive with torque enhancement. The overall bifurcation analysis for both concentrated and distributed winding machines confirms that the harmonic injection provides not only torque enhancement but also more robust controllers. This further advantage offers improved performance of multiphase drives compared to their three-phase counterparts.