High Temperature Device Characterization for Hybrid Electric Vehicle Traction Inverters

High temperature inverter involves thermal management, packaging, semiconductor device, switching circuit, and control circuitry. This paper is to focus on the drivetrain inverter design consideration for electric and hybrid electric vehicles. Basic structure and switching characteristics of different insulated-gate-bipolar-transistors (IGBTs) will be discussed. The use of silicon carbide Schottky diode in parallel with silicon IGBT will also be evaluated and compared with pure silicon IGBT modules running under both hard- and soft-switching conditions. Experimental results of conduction and switching loss at different temperature conditions are used to predict the device loss and associated junction temperature for switching cases.