Investigation of switching losses for sinusoidal PWM zero current switching inverter and resonant link inverter

In this study, simulations of two methods used for minimizing the switching losses occur in DC/AC inverters with PWM that is used extensively because of its high power density, fast response and control facility were carried out. First method which can be applied easily is the resonant link inverter. The other one is the resonant transition zero current switching inverter, which employs two auxiliary switches and LC resonance tank to assist switching transitions. In the study, sinusoidal PWM was used for gate signal. Switching signals are generally produced in consequence of comparing the carrier and reference signals. These inverters do not require any modification on conventional sinusoidal PWM scheme. Both inverters were simulated based on ORCAD´s actual device models. They were operated under the same conditions and the switching losses were analyzed. The results obtained show that the efficiency of the inverter with zero current transition method is considerably higher.