TDK Corporation has introduced a new tunnel magnetoresistance sensor for controlling high-speed automotive and industrial electric motors. Rotor position sensing solutions based on the new Micronas ASA 2310 offer a high resolution and accurate position measurement at very high rotation speeds of up to 650,000 rpm, enabling high-speed motors to maximize torque and increase efficiency which is essential for hybrid and electric vehicles to obtain maximum range.
“The ASA 2310 is a high-performance IC that extends the functionalities of a very precise analog TMR sensor and reduces the influence of noise and parasitic components caused by remote application setups where the sensor module is separate from the ECU and connected by a long wire-harness,” says Frederik Berstecher, product marketing manager for Fast Hall & TMR at TDK-Micronas.
“When combining it with TDK’s TMR TAS sensor family, customers can commercially scale their application setups depending on accuracy, EMC or functional safety requirements since the ASA 2310 can operate up to four TMR half-bridge sensors at the same time. Thus, rotor position sensor solutions based on the ASA 2310 can be used for a wide variety of safety-critical applications like power steering, brake boosters or traction motors.”
The sensors, powered and monitored by the ASA 2310, are detecting magnetic-field direction in x-y plane. The amplified single or differential ended output signals can be used to calculate the rotation angle of a magnet with very high accuracy by an external A/D-converter and an electronic control unit. The sensor system configuration works independently of the motor pole pair number without requiring complex hardware changes. This is a major advantage over inductive resolver technologies, says TDK, giving designers more flexibility in the development of the hybrid and electric powertrains of the future.
TDK-Micronas is the center of competence for magnetic-field sensors and CMOS integration within the TDK group, producing sensors and actuators for more than 25 years. It was the first company to integrate a Hall-effect based sensor into CMOS technology in 1993. Since then, TDK-Micronas has shipped over six billion Hall sensors to the automotive and industrial market. Headquartered in Freiburg, Germany, it employs around 1,000 people. See www.micronas.tdk.com.
