Research and improvement of a zero-voltage zero-current switching full-bridge converter

As is known to all, full-bridge topology is one of the most common circuits in the field of power technology. In pursuit of the efficient and diminutive power equipment all the while, soft-switching technology has been widely applied as an important instrument at present. In this paper, a novel zero-voltage zero-current switching (ZVZCS) full-bridge DC/DC converter is presented to improve the topology of previous circuit. The operation principle of previous topology has been analyzed at first. Since the ZVS effect of the previous converter’s leading-leg IGBT cannot be realized very well in the light-load situation, the previous ZVZCS full-bridge converter was optimized. For the purpose of testing and validating the operating principle of improved ZVZCS full-bridge converter and all the analysis, the simulation of this novel ZVZCS full-bridge converter has been carried out with the software PSPICE. With the purpose of charging up the electric vehicle’s power storage battery which will be used in 2008 Olympic Games, a prototype (10kW 130V/80A) adopting modified ZVZCS converter is designed and validated by experiment. Finally, the results of the simulation and experiment are provided to verify the principle of this novel ZVZCS converter. At the same time, five conclusions are provided too.