Design and implementation of a LLC-ZCS Converter for Hybrid/Electric Vehicles Davide GIACOMINI Principal, Automotive HVICs Infineon Italy s.r.l. ATV division
Need for clean Hybrid and Full Electric vehicles allow pollution reduction this make them the new generation of transportation Traction and power distribution networks are highly impacted by this evolution HV battery in hybrid/electric vehicles allow traction as well as services to run out of the battery for a medium/long time. 2
System Specification Power distribution network: exploiting the energy of a HV battery for traction and services While the traction inverter is directly supplied by the HV battery, all services in a car today still run out of a 12V battery, therefore a HV-DC/DC converter is needed to supply this battery line System has been designed considering these ranges Variable Min. Typ. Max. Input HVB [V] 250 350 450 Output LVB [V] 13 Load power [W] 400 2400 3
System design: converter topology choice 1. Galvanic isolated topology 2. Soft switching HV GD IG1 IG2 M1 GD HV Gate Driver IG3 Lr Cr IG4 n:1 M2 LV LV Gate Driver GD Controller board and isolation Behaves as current generator intrinsically protected @ short circuit at the output. ZCS has the advantages of using IGBT with co-packed fast diode; Simplified output filtering uses only capacitors; No need to control the DC current through transformer, resonance Cap solves it. 4
System design: control strategy AUIRS2191S GD HVB IG1 IG2 HV caps protection loop M1 AUIRS2191S Fast HVIC driver SO16 GD IG3 Inner Loop Cr voltage sense Lr Cr IG4 n:1 Cf LVB M2 LV Gate Driver Voltage Control Loop Error Amplifier AUIRS1170S synch. Rect. PSO8 analog controller IRS27951S SO8 analog controller Grounded in the HV side Analog Controller Primary High Voltage Side Optocoupler - + Vref Secondary Low Voltage Side Error amplifier and OV protection Grounded on the LV side 5
LLC DC/DC board, prototype picture 6
Board Layout Resonant Inductor at primary side Resonant Capacitor tank Output Capacitors Primary side IGBTs Primary side gate drivers Transformer Center tapped output Synchronous rectification Fets and control IC Loop control board Layout is optmised for system testing and debugging. 7
System design: main BOM components Output Flter Magnetics and Resonant Tank Mathlab routine has been implemented in order to design main parameters Transformer Resonant inductor Resonant Capacitor It is made with only Organic Conductive Polymer capacitor, 4mF in total no need for output inductor System volume and cost are reduced SR MOSFET voltage rating = 60V-80V higher power density and cheaper system Resonant inductor at primary side reduces size and weight; resonant capacitors also take care of balancing the magnetizing current Resonant inductor and capacitor values have been optimized vs. load and input voltage variation Magnetizing inductance Lm = abut 6 times resonant inductor value Transformer ratio is 16:1+1; Isec. = 170Arms Variable frequency from 60kHz to 125kHz Lr = 128uH Irms~15A System Resonant freq.: 125kHz Cr = 12,6nF 3kV C0G (low ESR) Synchronous rectification Fets Rds-on = 2,4mW max, 80V 3x each leg in parallel Primary switching section 650V 40A IGBTs Vce_sat= 1,80V @125C 8
Simulation results Transfer Function: switching from 70k to 120kHz at Vin=350V ~70kHz ~120kHz Simulation at Vin = 350V, Vout = 12V and different power output 9
Measurements: Operating Frequency vs Input Voltage and load KHz Fsw vs Vin at Io=100A 112 110 108 106 104 102 100 98 96 200 250 300 350 400 450 V KHz Fsw vs Io at Vin=350V 120 100 80 60 40 20 0 25 75 125 175 A Low switching frequency variation vs. input voltage and load changes Good matching with simulation 10
Operation at nominal input voltage: 400V 100A Primary current 25A/d Capacitor voltage 500V/d Sec.Center tap current 100A/d Clean sinusoidal voltage across resonance capacitors, some ringing noise visible on transformer s secondary current 11
Operation at nominal input voltage: 400V 150A Primary current 25A/d Capacitor voltage 1kV/d Sec.Center tap current 100A/d Frequency, capacitors voltage and Primary/Secondary currents increase 12
Operational waveforms at 400V -180A Primary current 50A/d Capacitor voltage 1kV/d Sec.Center tap current 100A/d Very close to resonance (~110kHz), waveforms are almost sinusoidal. 13
Secondary side synchronous rectification In a LLC converter the secondary current and primary switching voltage are not in phase and their phase rotation depends on the load, this effect doesn t allow to use the primary PWM signal to control the secondary side switches. A dedicated IC reading the VDS voltage across the Synch Rectification Fets solves this problem AUIRS1170S Typical application schematic n:1 Lo Vout RCC RCC Cout Rf Rf AUIRS1170S VCC Vg Rg Rg AUIRS1170S Vg VCC SYNC SYNC MOT Vs Vs MOT CVCC EN Vd RMOT Cf Cf Vd RMOT EN CVCC GND 14
Secondary side waveforms at 400V and light load Ch1= Vds [10V/d], Ch3= Vgate1 [5V/d], Ch4= Isec. [20A/d] Waveform obtained at low current output of 30A only: the signal across the 0,8mW equivalent Rds-on of the Fets becomes quite small but the gate command signal is regular. 15
Secondary side waveforms at 400V and high load Primary current 25A/d Blue: Vgs Light blue: Vds Sec.Center tap current 100A/d Waveform obtained at high current output of 160A: the signal across the 0,8mW SR Fets is much more evident as well as switching noise but the gate command signal is regular. 16
Power Losses Breakdown(350Vin) Estimation done though thermal measurement and mathematical estrapolations W 200 180 160 140 120 100 80 60 40 20 0 W 400 350 300 250 200 150 100 50 0 Io=100A Io=150A Primary side losses look still predominat and increase proportionally with the output current; High Vcesat of IGBTs still inpact this performances; Inductor losses seems to be increasing rapidly with output current, showing undersizing of the component, redesign is advisable; Resonant and output Capacitor losses have low inpact in the overall efficiency. 17
Efficiency results 1 0,95 0,9 0,85 Eff 300Vin Eff 350Vin Eff 400Vin 0,8 0,75 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 [A] Efficiency at light load is high, thanks to the low frequency operation of the input bridge; High Vcesat of IGBTs and inductor losses inpact overall system performances; At Iout=150A, only 1mW pcb trace resistance in the secondary side means 23W dissipated and 1,3% efficiency loss. 18
Start up and Vin transients Primary current 25A/d Capacitor voltage 1kV/div Vin; 100V/div Sec.Center tap current 100A/d Fast start: Vin rise time is only limited by the Lab power supply Vin=400V, Io=25A 19
Experimental results: load transient Output voltage 120A Switching frequency Output current 30A Low ESR output caps provide very low output voltage variation at load transients 20
Load transients : Iout from 70 to 140A Primary current 25A/d Vout ripple Sec.Center tap current 100A/d Load increase to 140A (traces 2 and 3 with AC coupling) 21
Load transients : Iout from 140 to 70A Primary current 25A/d Vout ripple Sec.Center tap current 100A/d Load decrease to 70A (traces 2 and 3 with AC coupling) 22
Conclusions 1. An Auxiliary DC-DC converter has been designed by using the uncommon LLC ZCS topology 2. System design flow with mathematical and electrical models have been utilized to tune the resonant tank and converter frequency operation range 3. Prototype has been built and verified 4. System efficiency over 90%, limited by high Vce_sat of IGBTs and inductor losses 5. Robustness to load transients has been verified 6. Prototype Max power is limited to around 2.0kW with air forced cooling, because of PCB and heat sinks limitations. 7. Next step: evaluate Super-Junction Mosfets performances in the same topology, adding Ultrafast diodes in parallel. 23