Robust sensorless speed control of PMSM drives for electric vehicle applications using integral sliding mode control and extended Kalman filtering

Accurate and robust sensorless speed control of Permanent Magnet Synchronous Motor (PMSM) drives is essential for high-performance Electric Vehicle (EV) applications operating under rapid speed variations, load disturbances, and repeated start–stop conditions. This paper proposes a robust sensorless PMSM control framework based on Integral Sliding Mode Control (ISMC) combined with Extended Kalman Filter (EKF) and Model Reference Adaptive System (MRAS) observers. Unlike previous studies focusing separately on control or observer design, this work provides an integrated robustness and estimation accuracy evaluation under realistic EV driving conditions. The proposed ISMC scheme is designed to improve disturbance rejection capability and eliminate the conventional reaching phase of sliding mode control. EKF and MRAS observers are employed for sensorless rotor speed estimation, and their performances are comparatively analyzed under multiple EV operating scenarios, including step speed changes, dynamic driving profiles, and repeated start–stop operation. In addition, a weighted performance index is introduced to quantitatively compare the considered control configurations. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed ISMC–EKF configuration achieves superior transient and steady-state performance compared with conventional PID-based control. The rise time is reduced from approximately 3.5 ms to 2.7 ms, while the settling time decreases from nearly 10 ms to about 5–6 ms. Furthermore, overshoot is reduced from 5% to 0.3%, and torque ripple is significantly minimized under dynamic EV conditions. Robustness analysis under parameter variations additionally confirms the disturbance rejection capability and stability of the proposed framework. The obtained results demonstrate that the proposed ISMC–EKF framework provides an efficient and reliable solution for high-performance sensorless PMSM drives in next-generation EV propulsion systems.