A new power electronics and electrical drives teaching program using DSPs and a non linear systems simulation language

Teaching power electronics and electrical drives to undergraduate students involves many challenges. These subjects require intricate waveform analyses, many of which are synchronised and have slow and very fast transients. The topics to be covered are enormous, consisting of many diverse areas such as magnetics, power semiconductor materials, advanced electronic circuit techniques, control theories and mechanics. Computer aided instruction via modeling and laboratory teaching via digital signal processors (DSPs) have recently been incorporated in the experiments for the professional elective subjects in power electronics and electrical drives at UNSW with a view to reduce these complexities. The experiments are supported with virtual instrument panels for quantities such as voltage, current, speed, position, torque, % voltage boost, FFT and so on. Numerical values of some useful quantities such various controller parameters, limits, etc are also displayed in the panel. These DSPs also produce the control and switching signals which are used in implementing certain types of power electronic converter or drive systems. These facilities have been added progressively over the last five years and their effectiveness in teaching the subjects have been watched closely. This paper describes these facilities at Australia´s University of New South Wales and their usefulness