Introduction

Energy is undoubtedly indispensable for societies and, especially, almost all kinds of industrial productions. Thailand, having its limited natural resources, increasingly requires energy in various forms imported from foreign countries. Therefore, efficient energy consumption is one of the most important R&D topics which is essential in Thailand. Ideally, driving force leading to renewable energy utilization or improvement of electricity generation is led by energy suppliers which are mainly organizations under governments in most countries. On the other hand, energy consumers can promote to more efficient energy consumption or even energy conservation. Direct impacts caused by energy conservation are, of course, the reduction of energy utilization and reduction in imports of crude oil. Alternatively, indirect results are lower emissions and consequently lower health problems arising from air pollution. It is found that, nowadays, energy consumption in industrial section is significantly high and tends to be increasing. Therefore, industrial control and automation technologies are of basic necessities which will gain productivities and enhance industrial standard for Thailand in order to sustain capabilities of commercial competitions in the world market.

The Industrial Control and Automation Laboratory (ICA lab), previously named as Industrial Electronics Lab, has been founded since1993. The objective of the lab is not only to conduct in-house research and development, but also to closely collaborate with and support local industries in R&D. In the past, the main R&D activities were focused on automation system and energy conversion. It is believed that, having many kinds of basic equipment and experienced staffs, the ICA lab can be a good partner for the local universities and private companies in R&D activities.

Missions

• To create, update, and build up knowledge in industrial control and automation, especially in regarding to motor and drive systems, energy conversion, motion control systems, SCADA communication, as well as preparations of human resources and suitable equipment in the institute.
• To apply industrial technologies, especially in regarding to efficient energy consumption, to industrial sector. To gain productivities and enhance reliable standard for Thai industrial sector.
• To promote personnel development and research network among universities and private sector in the field of industrial technology.

Research Strategies

• To cooperate in R&D activities with private companies, universities and conduct R&D in its own laboratory to find out synergies of knowledge, skills and expertises from all varieties.
• To emphasize more on system integrations based on specific requirements of the collaborating partners than on developing general purposed systems.
• To encourage the research staffs toward the NSTDA core competency, i.e.,
• To have high integrity
• To be good learners
• To have interpersonal skills
• To build up a strong teamwork
• To have expertises in related academic areas
• To establish a research network among academics and researchers in the area of interest in order to raise up exchanges knowledge and ideas, to make opportunities on high impact research works and then to increase performance of the staffs.
• To emphasize on inventive works in finding research topics from industrial sector by communication and visiting, including technology findings for industrial needs by cooperating with the cluster manager according to the NECTEC policies.

According to the team's performance in the past, motor drive, energy conversion, and control automation systems were developed for industrial automatic machines such as automatic stitching machines, computerized grinding machines, etc. This was to encourage Thai self-development in production of basic electrical machines and drives which is essential for Thai industrial development. The technologies were applied for various types of electric vehicles, including assisting systems for disability, for example, electric wheelchairs, hand driven electric tricycles etc. This causes positive social impact. Besides, together with Metropolitan Electricity Authorization (MEA), communication technology has been developed for monitoring electricity usage in Bangkok.

Funded Projects

• Computer based System for Automatic Manufacturing Control
• High performance control system for electrical distribution system
• Collaborative project with Metropolitan Electricity Authority based on Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition (SCADA) system
• Development on high efficiency motor for converting electrical energy to mechanical energy

Research Topics

The ICA lab has carried out many R&D and engineering projects, and made some

innovations and intellectual properties. In addition, it has built up collaborative network

among universities and related organizations. So far it concentrates on the following

research topics:-

• Motor and drive system,
• Energy conversion
• Database : Real time database
• Real time Linux : RTLinux, RTAI
• Electrical distribution system Protocol : DNP3, ICCP
• Motion control
• Man-machine interface

Lab Facilities

• AC Power Source / Analyzer 300 Vrms, 4500 A, 1 phase/ 3 phase
• Current Probe System 30 and 500 A AC/DC 50MHz
• Data Bucket
• DC Electronic Load 4 kw 100 A 500 V and 60 A
• DC Electronic Load 60 A 60 V
• Digital Power Meter
• In-Circuit Emulator (Intel 8051)
• In-Circuit Emulator (TI TMS320C24X)
• In-Circuit Emulator (Microchip 16CXX)
• Motor and Drive System for Test Bench 22 kw 3 phase induction motor 8,000 rpm
• Variable Transformer 3 phase 100 A 220/260 V
• Arbitrary Function Generator (AFG-310)
• C-Compiler for PIC 12/14/16/17/18
• Digital Clamp Tester 400 A 300 V
• Digital Multimeter
• Digital Oscilloscope 350 MHz 4Ch 1 Gs/s 100 Kpts
• Digital Oscilloscope 400 MHz / 2 channels
• High Voltage Differential Probe 1400 Vpk 1000 Vrms 100 Mhz
• High Voltage Probe DC 20 kv AC 14 kv 100 Mhz
• Temperature & Humidity Meter
• Torque meter
• Universal Programmer Super pro 280
• Universal Waveform Generator 4 ch 40 ms/s

Projects

Computer based System for Automatic Manufacturing Control

Computer-Controlled System for Manufacturing Automation is an R&D project in machine control technology, built from the middle strategy plan of National Research Agency. Also, it runs in the same way of national strategy. This project will join with partners, such as RdiPT, MTEC and other, for developing control technology. In the project, we focus in some kinds of machines like grinding machines, pipe cutting machines and milling machines for prototype developments. These prototypes will go to the products in 2006-2007. And we will develop lab-prototype motion controller based on DSP chip. This controller can control three-axis servo motors and can support both circular and linear interpolation in both point-to-point and continuous movements. The prototype is expected to be finished in 2007.

High performance control system for electrical distribution system

This project is the in-house project for supporting the DAS project. In the DAS project, we can divided in three parts as follows: Remote Terminal Unit (RTU), Communication Protocol, Master Station.

In the RTU, we do R&D in wireless communication between the RTU and Gateway. The CDMA and GPRS are used for testing the reliability, stability and scalability. The new compact, smaller, cheaper and wireless capable RTU has been developed and all of the working and usable functions are included.

In the protocol, we develop the Distribution Network Protocol, DNP version 3.0 subset level 1 and subset level 2 on serial fiber optic used in the phase I of the DAS project. We plan to move to TCP/IP in the future for use in the RTU in phase II DAS in which more functions and capabilities will be added.

In the Master Station, we develop database system that has redundant database server in phase I DAS project. Phase I DAS has a real time database that supports only 5 RTUs. So we plan to develop the speed of the real time database and increase the reliability of the DAS Server to support 400 RTUs in DAS 1 system.

Collaborative project with Metropolitan Electricity Authority based on Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition (SCADA) system

MEA has been undertaken many operations. One of the developments is in the power distribution 12 kV and 24 kV. These performances help support operations to fulfill the maximum power demand of 6,825 MW. The new technologies have been introduced for distribution system improvement and development such as the Distribution Automation System (DAS). This system is to reduce the cost of workers operations in the field when the area of problem out of electricity. Also this system can improve the stability of the System Average Interruption Frequency Index (SAIFI) and the System Average Interruption Duration Index (SAIDI).

The project is the collaborative research between MEA and NECTEC to develop the DAS that is made in Thailand. Before this project, the MEA bought all of the SCADA and DAS system including hardwares and softwares from a foreign country that caused many problems : softwares from different companies cannot interface seamlessly to each other, it needs to buy a new software when the hardware is obsolete although the software is still working, it cannot customize functions by an operator or addition charge, and it does not support Thai language and is not designed for Asian’s environment and etc.

The Memorandum of Understanding, MOU, had been signed by the directors of MEA and NECTEC to develop the Distribution Automation System. In the phase I, we installed the 5 RTUs and one Master station in Khet Khlong Toei and backup Master stations in the central of MEA at Wat Leab.

This project in phase I had been succeeded. We will continue in phase II for more functions in Master station and 50-100 RTUs in Khet Yan Nawa in 2008.

Development on high efficiency motor for converting electrical energy to mechanical energy

The aim of this project is to expand the R&D competency of our group. it was considered that the motor design technology would be a necessary and sustainable solution for several industries in Thailand. Since there is no motor design know-how in local company, therefore they inevitably obtained motor and drive system design from foreigner countries or from head office directly and do not have flexibility for their own machine designing. The research network among private companies and universities and R&D organization would strongly support those local companies. This project began from the Switched Reluctance Motor, since it has very simple and rigid stator and rotor structure while it has a good performance and efficiency. The stator and rotor core can be assembly from each silicon steel sheet without using any permanent magnet, therefore there is not any problem in production process in local company.

Research Topics

Motor and Drive systems

Electric machines major workhorses for industries because of their higher efficiency, lower acoustic noise and lower heat losses, compared to the other kinds of machines, such as an internal combustion engine, etc. Due to these reasons, they have been employed and developed constantly. In addition, many electrical appliances embedded with electric machines have been designed and built incessantly. To use them efficiently, it is necessary to pay high attention to energy conservation, as well as, encouragement to make industry relating to high efficiency motors and drives in the nation. This can be done by designing, building and testing motors and drives domestically to be able to produces many sizes of machines suitable for various applications. In the past, the team was developed drive systems for various kinds of machines, such as DC motor, induction motor, brushless DC motor and permanent magnet synchronous motor. Recently, switched reluctance machines have been initially designed and developed in the laboratory.

Energy Conversion

Energy conversion systems has been widely applied to many areas. They can be found daily in industrial and commercial tools, appliances and equipment, for example power supplies in many household applications. They play a major role in some applications, such as battery chargers, electronic welders, UPS's, electronic ballasts etc. The major reasons making it widely used are their high efficiency, small size and light weight. According to their advantages, especially their high efficiency (75-95%) compared to that of the conventional systems (40-60%), novel energy conversion systems has been replacing the conventional ones, particularly in industry, to efficiently conserve electrical energy.

Real time Linux: RTLinux, RTAI

We conduct R&D in RTLinux. It is a real time operating system that is suitable for a machine which has an event occurring in millisecond of period, especially in the RTU. RTLinux supports hard real-time operation through interrupt control between the hardware and the operating system. Interrupts needed for real time processing are processed by the real-time core. The RTLinux runs as a low priority thread. First-In-First-Out pipes(FIFOs) or shared memory can be used to share data between the operating system and the real-time core.

Electrical distribution system Protocol: DNP3, ICCP

The DNP3 is a set of communication protocols used between components in process automation systems. Its main use is in utilities such as electric and water companies. Specifically, it was developed to facilitate communications between various types of data acquisition and control equipment. It plays a crucial role in SCADA systems, where it is used by SCADA Master Stations (aka. Control Centers), Remote Terminal Units (RTUs), and Intelligent Electronic Devices (IEDs). It is used only for communications between a master station and RTUs or IEDs. ICCP, the Inter-Control Centre Protocol, is used for inter-master station communications.

Database: Real time database

We develop a real time database to support 12,800 points of 100 RTUs. Real-time databases are traditional databases used an extension to give the additional power to yield reliable responses. They use timing constraints that represent a certain range of values for which the data are valid.

Motion control

Multi-Axis Controller is a research topic focusing in motion control technology. Motion controllers are employed in many kinds of machines like milling, turning, grinding and laser cutting machine. A controller can control motors in multiple axes. These motors may be servo or step motor. In this research topic, we develop a system consisting of hardware prototypes and control algorithms. DSP technology and real-time OS are used in the controller. A control module in this controller using PID. The controller contains some trajectory generation algorithms such as linear interpolation, circular interpolation and blending. These algorithms work in both point-to-point and continuous movement modes.

Man-Machine Interface

Man-Machine Interface(MMI) is a research topic focusing in software technology that interfaces between users and the motion control system. MMI contains many software technologies include Windows and Linux programmings, algorithms, communications, artificial intelligence, image processing, database and web services. Systems or machines require different MMI technology like the master station of distribution automation system that requires communication, database and web service technologies, MMI in eye tele-analyzer system that requires communication and image processing technologies, MMI in grinding, milling and turning machine that require compiler, communication and real-time control technologies. This research tries to share some modules that contain in different machines. Many MMIs are developed in Windows and Linux systems and written in C++ programming. The way to share modules will reduce development time and cost of projects.

Staff Directory