• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.20 no.5
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• pp.448-455
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• 2015

A model predictive control (MPC) method without individual PWM has been recently researched to simplify and improve the control flexibility of a multilevel inverter. However, the input power of each H-bridge cell and the switching frequency of switching devices are unbalanced because of the use of a restricted switching state in the MPC method. This paper proposes a control method for balancing the switching patterns and cell power supplied from each isolated dc source of a cascaded H-bridge inverter. The supplied dc power from isolated dc sources of each H-bridge cells is balanced with the proposed cell balancing method. In addition, the switching frequency of each switching device of the CHB inverter becomes equal. A simulation and experimental results are presented with nine-level and five-level three-phase CHB inverter to validate the proposed balancing method.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Illuminating and Electrical Installation Engineers
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.68-74
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• 2004

This paper presents a novel hybrid multilevel inverter using DC-Link voltage combination in order to improve the waveshape of output voltage and reduce harmonics. The proposed multilevel inverter can generate an 11-level output voltage. It employs three H-bridge cell, which consists of single phase full-bridge inverter module. Among them, two modules are used for level generation, and one module performs PWM switching. Nine levels are synthesised by the level inverter, and two levels are added to output by the PWM inverter. As a result, it generates an 11-level. The operational principles are explained in depth, and the validity of the proposed system is verified through the PSpice simulation and experimental results based on a prototype.

• Proceedings of the KIPE Conference
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• 2008.06a
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• pp.388-390
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• 2008

본 논문에서는 새로운 H-bridge 멀티레벨 인버터 구조를 제안한다. 제안된 구조는 기존의 H-bridge 멀티레벨 인버터 구조보다 사용하는 스위칭 소자수가 적어 시스템 크기, 비용, 전력 손실, 노이즈 감소로 보다 효율적인 동작이 가능하다. 또한 레벨 수가 증가할수록 스위칭 소자는 비례적으로 감소하여 High level에서 보다 더 효율적인 동작이 가능하다. 제안된 H-bridge 멀티레벨 인버터 구조의 타당성을 검증하기 위해 PSpice 시뮬레이션을 수행하였고 제안된 구조의 우수성을 검증하였다.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Illuminating and Electrical Installation Engineers
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• v.28 no.10
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• pp.16-26
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• 2014

This paper proposes new 13-level inverter topology and DC/DC converter buck-boost structure topology for multilevel, compounding uni-directional and bi-directional switches, and proposes high-efficient multilevel inverter system in which the proposed two PCS(Power Conditioning System) was connected in series. In proposed multilevel inverter of forming a output 13-level phase voltage by using total 18 switching parts, Then bi-directional switch has a characteristic of reducing conduction loss and controlling the reactive power effectively by separating electrically from the neutral point. DC/DC converter for supplying in dependent 3 DC voltage to the proposed multi-level inverter generates 180-degree phase shifted PWM by the symmetrically combined structure of 2 buck-boost converter and twice switching frequency efficiency can be obtained, meanwhile, the converter can step up/down the output voltage and 20% output can be generated comparing the input voltage. This proposed system is verified with the simulation and laboratory test.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.9 no.6
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• pp.620-627
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• 2004

As h-bridge multilevel inverter is connected with series of single phase power cell, so it obtain high voltage using low voltage power semi-conductor and output voltage similar to sine wave. In this topology, the number of power cell increases in proportion to the output voltage level. Therefore, there are drawbacks that are responsibility against operating ability of main controller and signal wire increase. However, we can overcome this problems by the substitution of serial communication for the PWM signal in power cell control. Additionally, it has merits of reliability and maintenance. This paper deals with the synchronization and phase-shift method of power cell PWM using CAN(Controller Area Network) communication interrupt in H-bridge multilevel inverter. The advantages of proposed method are signal-line simplification using serial communication between main controller and cell controller, burden reduction in main controller, modularization of power cell, easy protection of each power cell, expandability improvement and reliability increase of control signal and power cell. This paper establishes propriety and reliability of proposed method through experiment of 13-level H-bridge multilevel inverter.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.574-585
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• 2015

This paper aims to improve the performance of conventional direct torque control (DTC) drives proposed by Takahashi by extending the idea for 5-level inverter. Hybrid cascaded H-bridge topology is used to achieve inverter voltage vector composed of 5-level of voltage. Although DTC is very popular for its simplicity but it suffers from some disadvantages like- high torque ripple and uncontrollable switching frequency. To compensate these shortcomings conventional DTC strategy is modified for five levels voltage source inverter (VSI). Multilevel hysteresis controller for both flux and torque is used. Optimal voltage vector selection from precise lookup table utilizing 12 sector, 9 torque level and 4 flux level is proposed to improve DTC performance. These voltage references are produced utilizing a hybrid cascaded H-bridge multilevel inverter, where inverter each phase can be realized using multiple dc source. Fuel cells, car batteries or ultra-capacitor are normally the choice of required dc source. Simulation results shows that the DTC drive performance is considerably improved in terms of lower torque and flux ripple and less THD. These have been experimentally evaluated and compared with the basic DTC developed by Takahashi.

• Journal of international Conference on Electrical Machines and Systems
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• v.1 no.4
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• pp.448-456
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• 2012

This paper presents a multilevel inverter configuration which is designed by insertion of a bidirectional switch between capacitive voltage sources and a conventional H-bridge module. The modified inverter can produce a better sinusoidal waveform by increasing the number of output voltage levels. By serial connection of two modified H-bridge modules, it is possible to produce 9 output voltage levels including zero. There are 24 basic switching patterns with the 9 output voltage levels. Among the patterns, we select the 2 most efficient switching patterns to get a lower switching loss and minimum dv/dt stress. We then analyze characteristics of Total Harmonic Distortion (THD) of the output voltage with variation of input voltage by computer-aided simulations and experiments.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.671-677
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• 2014

In this paper, a new basic unit is proposed. Then, a cascaded multilevel inverter basded on the series connection of n number of these new basic units is proposed. In order to generate all of the voltage levels (even and odd) at the output, three different algorithms to determine the magnitude of the dc voltage source are proposed. Reductions in the number of power switches, driver circuits and dc voltage sources in addition to increases in the numbr of output voltage levels are some of the advantages of the proposed cascaded multilevel inverter. These results are obtained through a comparison of the proposed inverter and its algorithms with an H-bridge cascaded multilevel inverter from the point of view of the number of power electronic devices. Finally, the capability of the proposed topology with its proposed algorithms in generating all of the voltage levels is verified through experimental results on a laboratorary prototype of a 49-level inverter.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• v.12 no.6
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• pp.2278-2288
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• 2017

Multilevel converter topologies are widely used in many applications. The cascaded H-bridge multilevel inverter (CHBMI), which is one of many multilevel converter topologies, has been introduced as a useful topology in high and medium power. However, it has a drawback to require a lot of switches. Therefore, the reliability of CHBMI is important factor for analyzing the performance. This paper presents a simple switch fault diagnosis method for single-phase CHBMI. There are two types of switch faults: open-fault and short-fault. In the open-fault, the body diode of faulty switch provides a freewheeling current path. However, when the short-fault occurs, the distortion of output current is different from that of the open-fault because it has an unavailable freewheeling current flow path due to a disconnection of fuse. The fault diagnosis method is based on the zero current time analysis according to zero-voltage switching states. Using the proposed method, it is possible to detect the location of faulty switch accurately. The PSIM simulation and experimental results show the effectiveness of proposed switch fault diagnosis method.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.522-532
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• 2018

The cascaded H Bridge (CHB) multilevel inverter (MLI) is popular among the classical MLI topologies due to its modularity and reliability. Although space vector modulation (SVM) is the most suitable modulation scheme for MLIs, it has not been used widely in industry due to the higher complexity involved in its implementation. In this paper, a simple and novel generalized SVM algorithm is proposed, which has both reduced time and space complexity. The proposed SVM involves the generalization of both the duty cycle calculation and switching sequence generation for any n-level inverter. In order to generate the gate pulses for an inverter, a generalized switch matrix (SM) for the CHB inverter is also introduced, which further simplifies the algorithm. The algorithm is tested and verified for three-phase, three-level and five-level CHB inverters in simulations and hardware implementation. A comparison of the proposed method with existing SVM schemes shows the superiority of the proposed scheme.