Analysis and design of snubber circuits for high-power GTO DC-DC converters

Author

Brambilla, Angelo ; Dallago, Enrico

Author_Institution

Dipartimento di Elettronica ed Inf., Politecnico di Milano, Italy

Volume

9

Issue

1

fYear

1994

fDate

1/1/1994 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

7

Lastpage

17

Abstract

This paper presents the analysis and the design of snubber circuits for high power DC-DC converters realized with gate turn off thyristors. These networks are fundamental for the safe operation of semiconductor devices but dissipate some energy. Means to minimize their losses are studied in this work. The snubber circuits described here are an evolution of the conventional C-snubber and L-snubber. The design of the snubbers is based upon circuits that permit the transfer of the trapped energy to the power source or to the load. Benefits, drawbacks and limits of each new proposed circuit are detailed and studied. Experimental results, obtained from a GTO laboratory prototype converter are reported

Keywords

losses; overvoltage protection; power convertors; thyristor applications; C-snubber; DC-DC power converters; GTO; L-snubber; circuit analysis; design; energy dissipation; gate turn off thyristors; laboratory prototype; load; losses; power source; safe operation; snubber circuits; trapped energy transfer; Choppers; Circuit faults; DC-DC power converters; Electron traps; Filters; Inverters; Snubbers; Thyristors; Transformer cores; Voltage;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Power Electronics, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0885-8993

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/63.285488

Filename

285488