Improvement of Running Behaviour in a Driving Personal Mobility Vehicles with a Hub Motor

Abstract

Personal Mobility Vehicles (PMVs), a new transportation system that links small electric mobility devices with public transportation, is attracting attention for its low environmental impact. Although PMVs called Segway have already been developed, their use on public roads in Japan is legally prohibited. Against this background, a foldable three-wheeled PMV that complies with the enforcement regulations of the Road Traffic Law has been developed in previous studies. However, the vehicle has a problem that the drive wheels suddenly stop during deceleration due to the protection function of the motor. In this study, we improve the driving of the PMV by replacing the motor to a hub motor, which is one of the brushless DC (BLDC) motors. In addition, since it is difficult to install encoders detecting the vehicle speed to the hub motor, we propose controlling the rotation speed of drive wheels using the three-phase sensor of the BLDC motor.