A high-density 1 kW resonant power converter with a transient boostfunction

A series/parallel resonant DC-DC converter with secondary-side resonance and a novel input boosting feature is described. In order to greatly reduce the conduction loss (factor of four) due to circulating currents in the resonant components, the boost circuit, which requires no additional active switches, operates only when needed during transient input voltage dips. This reduces the effective input voltage range over which the converter must operate and allows optimization at the steady-state input voltage. The converter employs highly efficient resonant inductors and novel Z-folded thin flex circuit transformer windings to meet a density of greater than 50 W/in³ with an efficiency approaching 95%. The DC-DC converter was developed for use as a 270 to 50 V line converter for distributed power applications     

Characteristics of load resonant converters operated in ahigh-power factor mode

The performance of the parallel resonant power converter and the combination series/parallel resonant power converter (LCC converter) when operated above resonance in a high power factor mode are determined and compared for single phase applications. When the DC voltage applied to the input of these converters is obtained from a single phase rectifier with a small DC link capacitor, a relatively high power factor inherently results, even with no active control of the input line current. This behavior is due to the pulsating nature of the DC link and the inherent capability of the converters to boost voltage during the valleys of the input AC wave. With no active control of the input line current, the power factor depends on the ratio of operating frequency to tank resonant frequency. With active control of the input line current, near-unity power factor and low-input harmonic currents can be obtained