Wound-field synchronous motors (WFSMs) fed by load-commutated inverters (LCIs) are widely used for high-power applications in many fields like ship propulsion, oil and gas industry, and pumped-storage hydropower generation. Several design architectures exist for LCI drives, depending on the number of LCIs and their dc-link connection as well as on the number of WFSM phase count. The prediction of LCI drive performance at steady state is important in the design stage, especially in regard to the prediction of the torque pulsations, which can give rise to serious mechanical resonance issues. This paper proposes an algebraic method to simulate the steady-state behavior of LCI drives in all their configurations of practical interest. Compared to conventional dynamic simulation approaches based on differential equation solution, the method is much more computationally efficient and requires a very limited knowledge of system parameters. Its accuracy is experimentally assessed by comparison against measurements taken on a real LCI drive arranged according to various possible schemes. Furthermore, the advantages of the proposed algebraic method over the dynamic simulations are highlighted by comparison against the simulation results on a high-power LCI-fed WFSM drive in MATLAB/Simulink environment.
