Independent current control of dual parallel SRM drive using a public current sensor

Switched reluctance motors (SRMs) have been considered a potential candidate for automotive applications due to its rare-earth-free feature and wide speed range. Conventionally, a current sensor is installed in each phase for the current regulation control, which will considerably add the cost and volume to multimotor drives. This paper proposes an independent current control technique for dual parallel SRM drives using only one current sensor. In order to identify the individual motor currents from the public current, a pulse injection scheme is developed accordingly. Two pulses are individually injected into the lower transistors of the dual converter in the excitation regions and the fixed current sampling points triggered by the injected pulse are presented for motor current identification. The independent current control for the dual SRM can be directly implemented by the public current sensing, although the motor parameters are different. The developed system requires only one current sensor without additional hardware or reduced system performance. The simulation and experimental results on parallel 750 W and 150 W three-phase 12/8 SRM drives are presented to confirm the effectiveness of the proposed method. With this scheme, the dual-motor drive can be more compact and cost effective for traction drive applications

Power converters in WBG device technology for automotive applications and characterization setups for GaN power transistors

This PhD dissertation envisages the design of innovative power converters exploiting WBG devices to get state-of-the-art performance in products intended for industrial applications of automotive field. The collaborations with different specialized companies, provided the opportunity to access commercially-available state-of-the-art SiC and GaN technologies and the possibility to realize innovative converter prototypes. Concerning SiC technology, the complete design of a $350kW$ Battery Emulator instrument in collaboration with a company leader in the automotive testing sector, was carried out from scratch exploiting state-of-the-art SiC power-modules, planar magnetics and top-notch MCU technologies. Discrete high-voltage GaN switches were exploited in the Power Supplies design for automotive charger application to target improved performances compared to the market state-of-the-art. Specifically, two high-efficiency prototypes, an AC/DC converter and a DC/DC converter of $7.5kW$, have been realized for this purpose. To further investigate the characteristics of state-of-the-art GaN power devices two measurement set-ups have been designed. In particular, the trapping phenomenon causing the collapse of drain current during ON-state with a consequent degradation of ON-resistance has been analyzed

Design and Control of Power Converters for High Power-Quality Interface with Utility and Aviation Grids

Power electronics as a subject integrating power devices, electric and electronic circuits, control, and thermal and mechanic design, requires not only knowledge and engineering insight for each subarea, but also understanding of interface issues when incorporating these different areas into high performance converter design.Addressing these fundamental questions, the dissertation studies design and control issues in three types of power converters applied in low-frequency high-power transmission, medium-frequency converter emulated grid, and high-frequency high-density aviation grid, respectively, with the focus on discovering, understanding, and mitigating interface issues to improve power quality and converter performance, and to reduce the noise emission.For hybrid ac/dc power transmission,• Analyze the interface transformer saturation issue between ac and dc power flow under line unbalances.• Proposed both passive transformer design and active hybrid-line-impedance-conditioner to suppress this issue.For transmission line emulator,• Propose general transmission line emulation schemes with extension capability.• Analyze and actively suppress the effects of sensing/sampling bias and PWM ripple on emulation considering interfaced grid impedance.• Analyze the stability issue caused by interaction of the emulator and its interfaced impedance. A criterion that determines the stability and impedance boundary of the emulator is proposed.For aircraft battery charger,• Investigate architectures for dual-input and dual-output battery charger, and a three-level integrated topology using GaN devices is proposed to achieve high density.• Identify and analyze the mechanisms and impacts of high switching frequency, di/dt, dv/dt on sensing and power quality control; mitigate solutions are proposed.• Model and compensate the distortion due to charging transition of device junction capacitances in three-level converters.• Find the previously overlooked device junction capacitance of the nonactive devices in three-level converters, and analyze the impacts on switching loss, device stress, and current distortion. A loss calculation method is proposed using the data from the conventional double pulse tester.• Establish fundamental knowledge on performance degradation of EMI filters. The impacts and mechanisms of both inductive and capacitive coupling on different filter structures are understood. Characterization methodology including measuring, modeling, and prediction of filter insertion loss is proposed. Mitigation solutions are proposed to reduce inter-component coupling and self-parasitics

High-efficiency voltage source converters with silicon super-junction MOSFETs

High-efficiency power converters have the benefits of minimising energy consumption, reducing costs, and realising high power densities. The silicon super-junction (SJ) MOSFET is an attractive device for high-efficiency applications. However, its highly non-linear output capacitance and the reverse recovery properties of its intrinsic diode must be addressed when used in voltage source converters (VSCs). The research in this thesis aims at addressing these two problems and realising high efficiency. Initially, state-of-art techniques in the literature are reviewed. In order to develop a solution with simple hardware, no major auxiliary magnetic components, and no onerous timing requirements, a dual-mode switching technique is proposed. The technique is demonstrated using a SJ MOSFET based bridge-leg circuit. The hardware performance is then experimentally investigated with different power semiconductor device permutations. The transition conditions between the two switching modes do not have to be tightly set in order to maintain a high efficiency. The dual-mode switching technique is then further investigated with a current transformer (CT) arrangement embedded in the MOSFET’s gate driver circuit in order to control the profile of the MOSFET’s incoming drain current at turn on. The dual-mode switching technique, with or without a CT scheme, is shown to achieve high efficiency with minimal additional hardware.High-efficiency power converters have the benefits of minimising energy consumption, reducing costs, and realising high power densities. The silicon super-junction (SJ) MOSFET is an attractive device for high-efficiency applications. However, its highly non-linear output capacitance and the reverse recovery properties of its intrinsic diode must be addressed when used in voltage source converters (VSCs). The research in this thesis aims at addressing these two problems and realising high efficiency. Initially, state-of-art techniques in the literature are reviewed. In order to develop a solution with simple hardware, no major auxiliary magnetic components, and no onerous timing requirements, a dual-mode switching technique is proposed. The technique is demonstrated using a SJ MOSFET based bridge-leg circuit. The hardware performance is then experimentally investigated with different power semiconductor device permutations. The transition conditions between the two switching modes do not have to be tightly set in order to maintain a high efficiency. The dual-mode switching technique is then further investigated with a current transformer (CT) arrangement embedded in the MOSFET’s gate driver circuit in order to control the profile of the MOSFET’s incoming drain current at turn on. The dual-mode switching technique, with or without a CT scheme, is shown to achieve high efficiency with minimal additional hardware

Air Traffic Management Abbreviation Compendium

As in all fields of work, an unmanageable number of abbreviations are used today in aviation for terms, definitions, commands, standards and technical descriptions. This applies in general to the areas of aeronautical communication, navigation and surveillance, cockpit and air traffic control working positions, passenger and cargo transport, and all other areas of flight planning, organization and guidance. In addition, many abbreviations are used more than once or have different meanings in different languages. In order to obtain an overview of the most common abbreviations used in air traffic management, organizations like EUROCONTROL, FAA, DWD and DLR have published lists of abbreviations in the past, which have also been enclosed in this document. In addition, abbreviations from some larger international projects related to aviation have been included to provide users with a directory as complete as possible. This means that the second edition of the Air Traffic Management Abbreviation Compendium includes now around 16,500 abbreviations and acronyms from the field of aviation

Modulación TPWM-DM para inversores de potencia

La técnica de modulación TPWM-DM (Trapezoidal Pulse Width Modulation with Direct Modulation) desarrollada en esta tesis, utiliza el método de modulación directa sobre una señal trapezoidal para obtener una señal modulada PWM a la salida de un inversor de potencia. Con ello se obtiene una señal, con unas características muy interesantes, que supera en calidad a otras técnicas de modulación. La modulación directa se diferencia de otros métodos de modulación utilizados habitualmente, en que no utiliza señales portadora ni moduladora. La señal modulada se obtiene por medio de cálculo algebraico. La señal trapezoidal tiene tres características particularmente importantes para poder aplicarle la modulación directa: (1) la amplitud de la frecuencia fundamental es grande; (2) contiene pocos armónicos no deseados; y (3) se describe por medio de ecuaciones lineales. Las dos primeras características hacen que la calidad de la señal sea alta, mientras que la tercera hace que su implementación se pueda realizar con microcontroladores de bajas prestaciones computacionales y, por lo tanto, de bajo coste ya que, como se demuestra en el Capítulo 3, ni siquiera es necesaria la implantación de las ecuaciones de modulación en el modulador, puesto que todos las patrones de conmutación de la modulación se pueden obtener a partir de un único vector-semilla. La calidad de la señal obtenida con esta técnica se mide utilizando siete indicadores de calidad de la señal; THD, WTHD, DF, A1 pu, LOH, PF50160 y f1, todos ellos definidos en el Anexo A1. El indicador PF50160, creado en esta tesis, aporta información sobre si la señal tiene o no el perfil de frecuencias establecido en la norma EN 50160. Antes de ser implementada, la modulación es simulada (Capítulo 4 y Anexo A2). De esta simulación se obtienen las primeras conclusiones sobre la viabilidad de la técnica. La implementación de esta técnica (Capítulo 5 y Anexo A3) se realiza utilizando microcontroladores comerciales de muy bajo coste que tienen un entorno de programación gratuito suministrado por el propio fabricante de los dispositivos. Las medidas realizadas sobre los prototipos ratifican las medidas realizadas en la simulación (Capítulo 6 y Anexo A4), lo que permite utiliza estos resultados como reales. De la comparación de los resultados obtenidos con esta técnica respecto a los obtenidos con otras técnicas de modulación (realizada en el Capítulo 6), se obtiene que con la técnica desarrollada en esta tesis se consiguen mejores valores de los indicadores de calidad. La señal modulada tiene una frecuencia fundamental de mayor amplitud y un perfil de frecuencias (espectro) mejor que con otras técnicas de modulación PWM. Esto repercute en que el rendimiento del sistema inversor se incrementa y los costes del mismo se reducen, llegando a ser posible la eliminación de los filtros de salida del inversor