Exploiting the Full Potential of Power Electronics Converters by Optimizing Operating Parameters - Power Loss and Thermal Measurement Data

The trend towards an all-electric society leads to an increasing demand for highly efficient power converters. Especially power supplies for higher power applications are often realized by multi- (two-) stage converters. This underlying work contributes an integrative approach to model and optimize the power converter losses and thermal behavior of the different stages. For optimization, it is important to develop a loss model that is both adaptable and calculation efficient to minimize time for optimization. The presented loss model is based on physical equations and datasheet parameters to account for simple adaptability. At the same time, it relies on analytical equations wherever possible to reduce complexity. The work results in a deviation of loss estimation below 4 % for modeling the losses of a built-up prototype power supply. The transient thermal model achieves a deviation below 5.3 %. Model complexity is minimized enabling the execution on a 160 MHz microcontroller for digital control within 95 ms while performing converter control at the same time. The loss model is finally used to optimize control parameters to either decrease power losses at a given transfer power or to optimize output power while aligning with maximum component temperatures. An average power loss reduction of 17.1 % is achieved by operation point variant operating parameters referred to optimized constant parameters. In a second optimization approach a transient output power increase of 11.2 % during the first 30 minutes of operation is reached by actively controlling the loss distribution to exploit thermal impedances.

This repository contains the power loss and thermal measurement data used to validate the loss and thermal model. It is provided in .tar archives as .csv files.