High Temperature Control Circuits for Rugged Duty Inverters

"This program will prove the practicality and feasibility of a high-temperature motor controller board suitable for operation at a heat sink temperature of 150¿C. We will design a microprocessor-based digital controller that will control an electric motorby means of PWM with the possibility to modify the PWM switching pattern, frequency, duty-cycle and deadtime. In Phase II, we will implement a PWM controller board for a three-phase DC-AC motor inverter that will operate at a 150¿C heat sink temperature.SatCon will work with military and commercial customers to define the requirments for both componet technology, i.e. gate drives, controls, and sensors, as well as the complete inverters functional at this elevated temperature. All forms of automotivepower electronics would benefit from a shift to a much higher heat sink operating temperature, it would enable air cooling or one coolant loop and would generally reduce the size and weight of the systems. This would also enable much tighter integrationof the power electronics with the machnes or systems being driven because temperature limitations will have been relaxed. By matching high temperature tolerant control circuitry with SiC power electronics a complete high temperature solution will beavailable for system integrators. These high temperature inverters would be of use to automakers for hybrid electric vehciles, as well as to the airframers for electric drives for flaps, land