A compact power converter for high current and low voltage applications

Traditionally, the power supplies employed in low voltage and very high current applications, such as electroplating, use line frequency transformers and thyristor-based control circuits. Such power supplies are bulky and inefficient, taking up valuable plant area and incurring significant operational costs. This study proposes an efficient and compact power supply suited to high current and low voltage applications. It uses a multi-level converter to convert line frequency input waveforms to a high frequency in a low cost and low loss manner. The output of the multi-level converter feeds an AC L-C-L resonant network to implement an easily controllable current source that, in turn, feeds a high current output stage. The output stage is modular, consisting of a number of easily constructed transformers and rectifier circuits that share voltage and current stresses. The proposed topology is modeled and simulated results are presented to verify its performance.