Onboard Integrated Battery Charger for EVs Using an Asymmetrical Nine-Phase Machine

This paper considers an integrated onboard charger for electric vehicles that incorporates an asymmetrical nine-phase machine and an inverter into the charging process. The charging is from three-phase mains, and it employs exclusively the power electronic components that already exist on board the vehicle and that are mandatory for the propulsion. No new elements are introduced. Moreover, the charging is achieved without any hardware reconfiguration since the existing elements and their connections are not altered during the transfer from propulsion to the charging mode. Instead, the operating principle is based on additional degrees of freedom that exist in nine-phase machines. These degrees of freedom are employed to avoid electromagnetic torque production in the machine during the charging process, although currents flow through its stator windings. The configuration operates with a unity power factor and is capable of vehicle to grid (V2G) operation as well. A detailed theoretical analysis is given, and the control for the charging/V2G and propulsion modes is discussed. Theoretical analysis is validated by experiments for charging, V2G, and propulsion operating regimes.