# AMM-P4 controller?



## agniusm (Apr 30, 2012)

Hi, does somebody used this controller? http://www.altmann.haan.de/P4/default.htm 
Perhaps heard about it? Need some feedback.
Cheers


----------



## Qer (May 7, 2008)

Seriously?

He's selling snake-oil. The HARD part in a controller to get bullet proof is the high power parts. He's letting the suc... customer sort that part out on their own (most likely with catastrophic results) while still cashing in EUR 1049! Also, he's cashing in EUR 1049 on the cheap parts of a controller, while you still have to pony up some serious bucks for contactor, transistors, casing etc etc etc before you (with some insane amount of luck) get a working controller at all.

I have a hard time deciding if this guy or PZ is the worst scammer I've seen trying to sell junk to DIYers. I think I'll call it a tie. Buy a real controller instead.


----------



## agniusm (Apr 30, 2012)

Thanks. Will dissmiss that find.


----------



## subcooledheatpump (Mar 5, 2012)

I've seen this before. I like the idea, but the price is way too high. 

I'd say $US100 at most. It's just a PWM generator with a gate driver for connection to an IGBT. You can buy a 3 phase controller with vector mode with the power electronics for that price. (though it'll be very low output power, but still)


----------



## frodus (Apr 12, 2008)

at least this guy did his own board design  lol

PZ barely did


----------



## Qer (May 7, 2008)

subcooledheatpump said:


> I've seen this before. I like the idea, but the price is way too high.


The problem is that his claims are completely insane. You can ad hoc together a rather small, low power controller for a lawn mower or possibly a low performance MC with pieces scattered around like in his pictures, sure, but when the units (A, V, kW) start to move into a few hundreds (especially if they all get into that range at the same time) and your design is, well, enthusiastic the ringing will be like all combined church towers in the world when Jesus returns.

That amount of ringing over the transistors can very easily blow the whole thing to kingdom come and it wouldn't surprise me that's the reason why he's using 1200 Volt transistors. Maybe the 600 Volt ones blew up due to insane ringing on the "bus bars", probably partly because the cap is "protected" by inductances (the wires) which means it won't really pull it's own weight.

Even claiming that you could aim for megawatts with this design is fraud if you ask me. Those levels of power are extremely volatile and it won't take much before you end up with an expensive paper weight, hobbling stuff together like on the pictures simply won't do.

And I really can't help wondering if anyone really want those components placed as in the pictures, close to your private parts when they lose control over that amount of power...?.


----------



## subcooledheatpump (Mar 5, 2012)

Well yeah, thats what I mean. 

A quick and dirty PWM controller to hook up to your IGBTs to do a nice (low power) test on your motor, seems like a good idea. Plus it's pretty small, put it in your pocket and test other IGBTs with it.

But such a device doesn't need to be $1K+

It won't drive big IGBTs at their full power (obviously), and the pictures on that website.... yeah those IGBTs would blow sky high. No doubt about it. He's got 1 small capacitor over two huge IGBTs in a chopper setup, don't know who he's trying to fool with that. Anyone with basic power electronics knowledge can see the flaws right away. No doubt there will be suckers who actually buy it and try to run the biggest IGBTs in the world with it


----------



## Chucky (Sep 23, 2010)

Hi there, 

this is Charles, maker of the AMM-P4 

I would like to explain a little bit about the P4 controller, it all started like this:

For my Quantya electric motorcycle, I wanted a controller with a drive mode that does not suck so much. All the available controllers had voltage drive only, and rather crippled torque control strategies.

So i decided to make my own controller. Okay I did not start from scratch, I am an electrical engineer for many years and have my own electronics company "ALTMANN MICRO MACHINES" that is specialized in motorcycle ignition systems, industrial control, high-end audio devices and many other things 

My first attempt was to make a small controller only for the Quantya bike. It is shown here:
http://www.altmann.haan.de/riding_on_electrons/default.htm

This controller worked very well, it already had the tru-torque drive mode, which is an unbelievable improvement over the standard voltage control. 

Now, riding the bike is like floating in space, it is so easy, no more jerks, perfect response means -> pefect curves too.

However, the MOSfet transistors I was using in this first setup, were prone to blowup due to increased dV/dt rating and although I was using a very special massive 3..4 mm copper pcb, the power output was good for the Quantya, but it was limited.

Also, in this first version I realized how dangerous an electric vehicle _can_ become, if you have a fault in the power section, and there is no reliable automatic shutdown over an external power switch. This automatical shutdown is especially problematic, if you want to have a perfect torque control.

At this time 'Claudio' - the owner of the Quantya bike company visited my laboratory together with his test-driver Matteo, and Martin, the technical manager for Quantya Germany.

Matteo tested the controller on my bike, and said the bike had not enough power. I explained to them that I was using a longer transmission on the bike in order to obtain higher top speed and therefore it was less aggressive in the low end. I could see in their faces, that they have never tried a faster setup on their bikes  

Also with the tru-torque drive mode, as you control the torque directly with the throttle, full torque will be applied only with full throttle. This is totally different to a speed-drive mode, where full torque is available also at a low throttle setting, if the motor speed is low.

They had brought to market the very best electric motorcycle, but they did not seem to be involved much with the workings of an electric motor ...

So I gave them more amps on the controller and Matteo went for another test ride, and _BAM_ all the Mosfets blew up 

So they were quite frustrated with the show, I was frustrated because they did not seem to understand what I was aiming at. They were looking for more power more power more power, since the Alltrax units kept blowing up in their Quantya-parks. But at least .. they were cheap.

As I had already invested significant time and resources, I could not let the whole project die, but it had to become more versatile, more powerful, more secure and in a way - finished.

So the decisions for the AMM-P4 were set. It needed an external power stage with much more powerful, more robust transistors (IGBTs) that have no dI/dt destruction mechanism, and can be easily stacked and water-cooled.

The use of external IGBTs elegantly loosened the voltage and current restrictions, so you can run on any amount of batteries.

The AMM-P4 has a very powerful gate drive and can run several of those large IGBTs in parallel.

Additional to this, elaborate safety mechanisms were built into the AMM-P4, that would detect transistor failure immediately (also in tru-torque drivemode) and shut the complete system down in a couple of milli-seconds.

This safety feature sounds simple, but it is not. It includes mechanisms for each critical component on the whole system, incl. the operational amps and trimmers for the current measurement, the relay, the charge pump, even the controller itself. 

It would be correct to say that 90% of the workings of the AMM-P4 are busy with safety only, and the remaining 10% are for the actual job.

Of course, standard- and Tru-torque-drivemodes are switchable in real-time depending on the drive requirements.

The actal P4 is introduced and explained here:
http://www.altmann.haan.de/P4/default.htm

I have read an amount of criticism concerning the design, and at the same time I see people taking advantage of all the information given on my websites and trying to come up with a copy of my basic ideas.

This is okay for me, but please do not neglect the importance of safety mechanisms. An electric vehicle can be very dangerous. Transistors not only blow dead off, they can also blow dead-on. So please be careful with all your designs.

Sorry for the long post, and have a great ride, 

Charles


----------



## Salty9 (Jul 13, 2009)

Qer said:


> . . . .the ringing will be like all combined church towers in the world when Jesus returns. . . .


with this imagery you sound like a poet.


----------

