Advanced Fly-By-Light Control of Electric Flight Control Actuator

We propose a high speed bipolar power semiconductor whose on/off operation is directly controlled by fiber coupled laser pulses for driving flight control motors. The direct light activation results in a) an increase in the switching power and speed of the device over the IGBT, which will reduce the size and weight of the motor control system, b) in a virtually noise immune motor control system. Control light pulses are delivered through fibers traveling in alternate paths through the structure to control the on - off operation of the power semiconductor in a logic or function directly. Thus, the presence of a signal from any or all of the fibers will cause the same switching action, thereby providing battle hardened configurations without additional signal processing.