Analysis and optimization of regenerative linear snubbers

The regenerative linear turn-on and turn-off snubbers are analyzed and optimized independently. The optimization for fixed supply voltage and load current is done in terms of minimum total energy losses in the power electronic circuit during switching. It is shown that the dissipative summer, which up to now has been the only optimized snubber, becomes a special case of this general linear snubber. Equations describing the most important parameters are presented in normalized form in tables, and some energy results are presented in graphical form. Calculated results show that if the regenerative snubber´s recovery efficiency is higher than 67%, the above mentioned optimum snubber can be used to perform snubbing action during the complete fall-time transition