DIGESTS OF PAPERS

MODULATORS, FREQUENCY-CHANGERS AND DETECTORS USING RECTIFIERS WITH FREQUENCY-DEPENDENT CHARACTERISTICS

621.396.619.2:621.396.622 Paper No. 1139 RADIO SECTION

D. G. TUCKER, D.Sc, Associate Member

(DIGEST of a paper published in September, 1951, in Part III of the PROCEEDINGS.)

The calculation of the performance of modulators and similar circuits using copper-oxide or selenium rectifiers is complicated by the fact that the resistance characteristic of the rectifiers varies with frequency. The dependence on frequency is very marked, since the simple equivalent circuit of the rectifier based on resistance and capacitance in parallel shows a resistance component at negative bias voltages which falls, in a typical small copper-oxide rectifier, from perhaps 100 000 ohms at audio frequencies to only about 100 ohms at 6 Mc/s. The fall of resistance with frequency is very much smaller at positive bias voltages, and the shunt capacitance also varies comparatively little with frequency. It is found that an approximately equivalent circuit of the rectifier which allows at least some practical applications to be calculated is as shown in Fig. 1. Here a rectifier which has no frequency dependence is shunted by a capacitance and also by a linear resistance which falls as the frequency rises. When this device is used in modulator circuits with terminating impedances
Dr. Tucker is in the Royal Naval Scientific Service, and was formerly at the Post Office Research Station.

which are finite only at a finite number of modulation-product frequencies and are zero at all other such frequencies, then the equations developed for rectifiers without frequency dependence

, Approx. ' constant JFreguency dependent ^ Voltage dependent Fig. 1.Equivalent circuit of a rectifier. can be used, since the frequency-dependent linear resistance and the capacitance can be absorbed into the terminating impedances. The paper includes some detailed examples and shows how the conversion loss of modulators using these rectifiers can be stabilized.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE ELECTRICAL SYSTEM ON THE BRISTOL BRABAZON I MARK I AIRCRAFT
621.311.28:621.34:629.135 Paper No. 1131 UTILIZATION SECTION

M. J. J. CRONIN, Associate
(DIGEST of a paper published in September, 1951, in Part I of the PROCEEDINGS.)

In the last seven to ten years there has been a great increase in the use of electricity in aircraft, and whilst this has been a general trend, it has been more evident in the large civil and military post-war aeroplanes. Under the stimulus of the 1939-45 War, great progress was made with the development of aircraft electrical equipment, and a brief and general summary of this is given in the paper. The main object of the paper is, however, to deal with the power supply. Up to the end of the last war, our large bomber aircraft were fitted with four 1-5-kW or four 3-kW 28-volt d.c. generators, but it soon became obvious that the capacity of these machines would be quite inadequate for the majority of the post-war aircraft, and 28-volt d.c. generators up to 10 kW were subsequently developed. At the same time, in order to reduce cable weight, it became necessary to consider the adoption of 112-volt d.c. and 208-volt 3-phase 400-c/s a.c. systems, as both were being considered as standard supplies for large American and British aircraft. A typical installation of the latter type is the one used in the Brabazon I Mark 1 aircraft. The electrical installation is, broadly speaking, a 208-volt a.c./28-volt d.c. system, which uses the a.c. power for heating loads, such as propeller anti-icing (76 kW) and other electrothermal services, and the extra-low-voltage d.c. power for the large amount of electrical equipment, which has reached a highly developed state and cannot be reasonably replaced by higher-voltage equipment. Other special supplies for gyroscopic instruments, auto-pilot, radio, radar, etc., are obtained from
Mr. Cronin is with the Bristol Aeroplane Co., Ltd.

115-volt 400/1 200-c/s inverters operating from the 28-volt d.c. busbars. As it was estimated that approximately 150kW would be required to serve the unusually large number of electrical services, the choice of a medium-voltage system was natural, and in view of its inherent and prospective advantages, an a.c. system was chosen, using six 3-phase 30-kVA alternators as the primary source of supply. Also, to avoid extra accessory drives for d.c. generators, and the added maintenance and brush wear problem associated with these machines, six 3-phase 6-kW metal rectifiers were fitted to provide the extra-low-voltage d.c. supply. Much of the development time on the Brabazon electrical installation was spent in overcoming the problem of operating the generators over the wide speed range of the engines. In most aircraft with smaller electrical power demands, it was possible to disconnect the generators from line at the lower speeds and to permit the loads to fall on the batteries. In the Brabazon, however, a generated supply was necessary over a 4 : 1 speed range (720-2 800 engine r.p.m.) and investigations were made into the use of constant-speed drives, auxiliary generating plants and extra-fine-pitch stops on the propellers. Finally, as a result of these investigations, a wide-speed-range electrical system was evolved. The alternators used in this system are of optimum design, inasmuch as they are rated for their full output over a narrow speed range (7 600-10 000 r.p.m.), but by accepting a reduction in the power output with reduction of speed, it is possible to operate them over the 4 : 1 speed range as variable-voltage 268