Two-switch forward soft-switching PWM DC-DC power converter

S. Hamada, S. Moisseev and M. Nakaoka

A novel prototype is presentcd of a two-switch forward softswitching PWM DC-DC power converter with rcduced switching and conduction power losses, which can operate tinder two soft

frequency transfonner links. The gate voltage pulse switching timing scquences and ideal opcrating waveforms of this converter are illustrated in Fig. 2. Bv varving the ohase-shifted delav Lime t, ah , a continuous control variable under thc condition of zero voltage switching (ZVS), the DC output voltage E,, of this converter can be linearly regulated using a duty cy& control scheme. Thc half cycle operation call be represented for the eight operation modes ill state,

commutations of zero voltagc and zero current of full bridge circuit tooolow. . -. Introduction: In actual applications, previously developed full bridge soft-switching PWM DC-DC converters with additional passive and active power resonant components [I] suffer from certain disadvantages such as the increased conduction losses due to the circulating current and peak stresses of power semiconductor active devices. To overcome thesc practical problcms, a new inlcrleaved two-switch forward soft switching PWM converter with a tapped inductor and smoothing capacitor as a lowpass filter is introduced for the first time.

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E = 260, Eo = 50V, 10 = 1 0 A , f = l0OkHz a Voliage and current of Sz b Voltagc and current of S4

Converter operation: Assume that at time tal SI,S and D, are still , conducting. (i) Mode 1 (to, tI): At time t = to, S, is turncd off under ZVS with the aid of lossless snubbcrs Cl and C,. Since the magnetising inductances Lpz and LEIare sufficiently large compared with the leakage inductances Lsl and L , of T I and T2,magnetising currcnt iFzof T2 and diode rectifier current are considered to be constant during this interval. As V,, across C, increases, a rectified in each transformer secondary side decrcases as V , = voltage ( E - Vc,)/Ny.. , is defined as the turn ratio NT = N,/N, of each N transformer. Sincc Lclland La are tightly coupled to one another, thc freewheeling diode D, slarts to conduct when V,reaches N,,E, under the condition of NL = n,/(n, n2), where n, and n2 are the Fig. 1 A'ew interleaved soft switching forward converter with one output turn numbers of&, and La, respectively. port (ii) Mode 2 (t,, 1,): The output current I, of the tapped inductor type lowpass filter flows through D7, L, and Lc,l.The output cur_ IT/2 7 - reflected to the transformcr primary side begins to decrease. rent This mode ends when the voltage ITtz drops to zero. (iii) Mode 3 (tz, t J : D2 starts to conduct. The output current reflected to the primary side of T2 continues to decrease. This interval ends when the diode rectifier current i<16 reachcs zero. (iv) Mode 4 (t3,f4): The output current I, flows through D7, a and Ldl.The output current reflected to the transfoimer primary side becomes zero. Only a small magnctising current of T, freewheels through S, and D2. This modc completes wlien S, is turned off. (v) Mode 5 (t4, ts): At time tq corresponding to a delay time ts, S, is turned off undcr zero current switching (ZCS). Magnetising current ipz of T2 flows through the feedback diodcs D2 and D4to E as a reset action of T,. Then i2'2 decreases. (vi) Mode 6 (ts, t6): At time f5, depending on the duty ratio of the PWM converter, S, is turned on undcr ZCS because the leakage inductance LSl of T, softcns diirlldtcapability stress at turn-on of S,. S, is completely turncd 011 with ZVS and ZCS when the cnrrent i,, due to Ls2 becomes i,, i0. The output current renected to the primary side of thc transformer flows through S2 and S,. The magnetising current ipl of T , and the diode rectifier current i,is begins flowing through S, and S, and D5, respectively. On the other hand, the current iLz flowing through Lllz decreases. This mode ends when ,i reaches zero. (vii) Mode 7 (t6,t,): D, turns off. The output current I, flows The magnetising current ip2 continues to through D5 and decrease with a constant negative slope -E/L,. (viii) Mode 8 (t7, t8): When the magnetising current ip2 becomes zero at t = t7, D4 turns off. The energy is delivered through S,, S,, TI and Ds. The half cycle of the circuit operation is completed at time tg. The steady-state circuit operation in each mode for Lhc succesive next half-cycle is completely symmetrical with that of the half-cycle opcration mentioned above. SI and S, in the bridge Circuit configuration: Fig. 1 shows a proposed soft switching arms of the left-hand side are turned on and turned off with a PWM forward DC-DC power converter with two separate high-

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ZVS mode transition, while S, and S4 in the bridge arms of the right hand side operate with a ZCS mode transition at turn-on and tum-off. The idle circulating currents in both the primary Np and secondaty N , sides of T , , T2 are substantially lowered with n o additional active and passive circuit components and devices in order to use the tapped inductor for a lowpass filter.

Experimental results and evaluations: To confirm the operation principle of the proposed converter, experiments were built and tested with a 500W ( E = 260V, E, = 50V, I, = 10A inverter frequency f = l/T = 100kHz; ripple frequency 200kHz) breadboard setup using IGBTs (IRG4PC40W) as the active power switches. Typical voltage and current waveforms of the active power devices were observed under soft commutation conditions as illustrated in Fig. 3. The actual converter efficiency as a function of the output current I, under a constant output regulation scheme in a closed feedback loop control system was 93.5% or more for full load I , = IO(A) to light load I, = 2(A). Conclusions: A new interleaved two-switch forward soft-switching PWM DC-DC power converter has been proposed and tested. Its operating principle has been described. Its salient features are as follows: (i) reduced switching losses over a wide range of load variations and specified voltage settings; (ii) no circulating currents due to the actual effect of a tapped inductor filter, resulting in less conduction losses; (iii) no additional active and passive circuits, resulting in high power density; (iv) no flux imbalance of the two separate transformers owing to the reset action of feedback diodes D3/D4;(v) ZCS of diode rectifier in transformer secondary side due to transformer leakage inductance and leakage inductance of the tapped inductor; and (vi) less conductive noise.
0 IEE 2000 10 October 2000 Electronics Letters Online No: 20001474 DOI: 10.1049/e1:20001474 S. Hamada (Power Electronics R & D Division, Sunsha Electric Mfg. Co., Ltd., Osaka, Japan) S. Moisseev and M. Nakaoka (Division o Electrical and Eleclronics f Engineering, Yamaguchi University, 2-16-1 Tokiwadai, Ube City, Ynmaguchi, 755-8611, Japan) E-mail: sergeyape-news1.eee.ydmaguchi-IL.ac.jp

end was used by Pozar [4]. In both cases, the offset of the feed point leads to perfect impedance matching in a narrow frequency band. Therefore, a large number of techniques for widening the bandwidth of microstrip antennas have been proposed. Increases in bandwidth of 47% for a bi-directional slot antenna and 24% in the case of a cavity-hacked radiator have been observed [7]. Recently, an operational bandwidth of 60% for a microstrip-fed slot antenna was investigated [8]. In this Letter, we present a cross-shaped microstripline-fed slot antenna. The bandwidth of the antenna greatly depends on the length of the horizontal and vertical feed lines as well as on the offset position of the feed line. In this case, the many parameters of the antenna lead to impedance matching over a wide frequency hand. This single-layer single-slot microstrip antenna retains thin profile characteristics. As will he seen, it is easily implemented at microwave frequencies and exhibits extremely broadband performance.

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Fig. 1 Structure and design parameters of antenna

References
1
CHO,J.G., RIM,G.H., and LEE, F.c.: Zero voltage and zero current switching full bridge PWM converter using secondary active clamp. IEEE Power Electron. Spec. Conf. Rec., 1996, Vol. 2, pp.

657-663

Experimental results; For design purposes the printed slot antenna with a cross-shaped microstrip feed line (Fig. 1) is better than conventional-fed structures. Fig. 1 shows a structure of the antenna, consisting of the slot radiator and cross-shaped feed line, where I, is the length of a slot, W, is the width of a slot, lf, is the length of the horkontal feed line, I,, is the length of the top vertical feed line, offset represents the gap from a slot centre to the centre of the horizontal feed line, and W, is the width of the microstrip feed line. This antenna was fabricated with a relative permittivity of 4.3 and a dielectric thickness of 1.Omm. The input impedance and the return loss of the antenna were measured with an HP8510 network analyser and the far field patterns measured inside a compact range available at the ACE antenna corporation (in the Republic of Korea).
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Broadband cross-shaped microstrip-fed slot antenna

Y.W. Jang
A cross-shaped microstriplinefed slot antenna of large bandwidth is described. The experimental bandwidth of the antenna is from 1.765 to 4.921GHz, which is 98.59% for SI, 5 -1OdB. The measured radiation pattern of the antenna is also presented. Introduction; The slot antenna has been investigated since at least
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the 1940s [I], and is treated in many electromagnetic textbooks [2]. However, the major drawback of microstrip antennas in their basic form is their inherently narrow bandwidth. The narrow bandwidth of these antennas is a major obstacle that restricts their widespread use. In general, transverse or slanted slots are cut in the ground plane of a microstrip line and present series impedance 4 demonstrated simple to the feed line. Yoshimura [3] and Pozar [ ] techniques of narrow hand (a few percent of the bandwidth [5, 61) matching of the slot radiator. T o overcome this difficulty, Yoshimura [3] shifted the feed point from the centre of the slot and short-circuited the feed microstrip through the dielectric substrate with the slot side, which is located further from the feed input. A similar technique of feed-point shifting close to the slot

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Fig. 2 shows the measured impedance locus, exhibiting a multilooped characteristic, which can he contrasted with that of slol antennas having a conventional microstripline-fed structure. The return loss against frequency is show in Fig. 3. The bandwidth is

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