IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 20, NO.

2, APRIL 2005 789

Study of Parameters of a Tripler Using the Finite

Element Method of Harmonic Balance
J. H. Wang, X. F. Wang, and Y. H. Song

Abstract—In this paper, a new harmonic balance analysis ap-
proach based on the finite element method (HBFEM) is used to
calculate the equivalent leakage reactance and the core loss in a
magnetic frequency tripler. The HBFEM presented can be used to
analyze harmonic magnetic field for time periodic magnetic field
with B H curve described by any high order polynomial. Con-
sequently, the current and flux density waveforms include many
harmonic terms caused by saturation. An equivalent leakage re-
actance model of magnetic frequency tripler is presented based
on the harmonic terms. The resulted harmonic-rich flux density
waveforms are used to calculate core losses and equivalent leakage
reactance. Simulation results are compared with experiment re-
sults and it is shown that the approach and model are correct and
practical.
Index Terms—Core losses, finite element method, harmonic bal-
ance, leakage inductance model.
polynomial. In this paper a new HBFEM is proposed. It can be
effectively used to analyze harmonic magnetic field with
curve represented by any high order polynomial.
In [3] the equivalent circuit of magnetic frequency tripler is
given. Owing to its operation at high saturation state, its leakage
inductance is much higher than general transformer and their
operating state will be different. It is difficult to determine the
leakage inductance of a tripler and there is no publication con-
cerning this question up to now. In this paper the leakage induc-
tance mathematical models of a magnetic frequency tripler are
developed. The results of numerical simulation are consistent
with the experiment results and thus illustrate the correctness of
the proposed method. It presents an effective analysis method
for obtaining the equivalent circuit parameters of a tripler.

I. INTRODUCTION II. IMPROVED HARMONIC BALANCE FEM

According to the harmonic balance finite element method
T HE magnetic frequency tripler is not only the key trans-
former in a fractional frequency transmission system [1]
but also a potential apparatus of electric energy converter appli-
(HBFEM) proposed by [2], the matrix for one element is de-
termined by:
cable in other industrial fields, which can significantly increase
the efficiency of high speed rotation devices. A magnetic fre-
quency tripler is usually composed of three single-phase trans-
formers with star-connected primary windings and open delta-
connected secondary windings. Thus it can be driven into sat-
uration. Since the neutral of the star-connected primary coils is (1)
isolated from the power supply neutral and when it is driven into
saturation, the flux is not proportional to the input current and where , , are determined by triangular coordinate values.
can produce such contents which contain not only fundamental, If the highest order of harmonic is 5, the block matrix is
but also odd harmonic components with arbitrary magnitude and given in (2) and is a constant concerned with harmonic order.
phase. Then the triple harmonic power is the unique output be- Therefore, it can be called the harmonic matrix. The structure of
cause the secondary windings are open delta-connected. In the the matrix is expressed by (3). The coefficients of the matrix
harmonic voltages, the third harmonic voltage is the most im- are determined by both parameters
portant component.
Therefore, it is necessary to analyze the harmonic magnetic
field of a tripler. [2] proposed a harmonic balance finite element
method by combining the FEM and harmonic balance method.
(2)
It can provide the distribution of harmonic magnetic field. But
the curve is represented by the low order polynomial and
its reluctivity matrix is very complicated. As the performance of
magnetic materials have been greatly improved, it is necessary
to simulate the curves more accurately by higher order
(3)
Manuscript received December 16, 2003; revised May 15, 2004. Paper no.
TPWRD-00634-2003.
J. H. Wang and X. F. Wang are with the Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an,
China.
Y. H. Song is with the Brunel Institute of Power Systems, Brunel University,
London, U.K. of curve and the flux densities of each harmonic. The
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TPWRD.2005.844294 matrix acts as a reluctivity and so is called reluctivity matrix.
0885-8977/$20.00 © 2005 IEEE
790 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 20, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

It can be proved that the matrix is symmetric. The way to
obtain the coefficients of matrix can be stated as follows:
First we consider the expression of reluctivity . Because
a sine function of any order can be regarded as the com-
bination of the harmonic sine functions, the expression of
can be expressed by linear combination
of the harmonic sine functions but the items and coefficients are
different. In order to simplify the solution, the state variables
(magnetic flux density) is expressed as
The system equation for the entire region is obtained by the
same procedure as the conventional FEM and is solved by the
method as a nonlinear static magnetic field. The above method
does not require the calculation concerned with time and can
solve the time-periodic field harmonic distribution. But when
the harmonic components considered are up to order,
the size of the block matrices and become and the
order of the system matrix is times bigger than the number
of nodes, and so it is a sparse matrix.

III. CALCULATION OF TRIPLER CORE LOSSES

The saturated core loss can be classified into two parts: the
first one is caused by the fundamental component of the flux
(4) density; the second part is due to the effects of the harmonic
contents on the eddy current loss and the minor loop hysteresis.
The core loss of the fundamental component can be calcu-
where is the order of the highest harmonic. is a sinu- lated from the peak values of flux density and material param-
soidal function of time eters (hysteresis and eddy current loss parameters); these pa-
rameters are usually provided by the magnetic material manu-
(5) facturers or can be obtained from Epstain loss characteristics of
the given core materials. The well-known core loss equation is:
where , here means integer di-
vision. in (5) is defined as, (8)
so that the function has only two outcomes, where is per unit core loss, and constants , is determined
from the Epstain loss characteristic of core materials adopted.
is odd
The core losses of the harmonic content can be estimated
is even
using the hysteresis and eddy current correction factors that
were developed by Lavers, et al. [4]–[6]. The eddy current cor-
is the coefficient of the harmonic components of ; rection factor is:
is the coefficient of the harmonic components combination ex-
pressed by the th order of . In order to simplify the calcu-
(9)
lation, the approximate equation neglects the harmonic compo-
nents with order higher than . Obviously, in (4) this simpli-
fication will produce some errors. But because the coefficients where
of higher order harmonic are very small, this error does not pro- magnitude of the fundamental flux density;
duce significant influence. The simulation results demonstrate magnitude of the th flux density;
this point. peak value of the distorted flux density.
In (4), is determined by harmonic amplitude of The hysteresis minor loop factor is
and can be calculated by computer according to the following
(10)
recurrence formula [3]:
where . Here , ,
represent the flux density reversals associated with the flux den-
sity waveforms.
(6) The combination of harmonic loss with fundamental sinu-
soidal loss represents the total core losses due to the distorted
The basic deduction of the above formula is based on the flux density waveforms. The fundamental sinusoidal loss can
trigonometric function transformation principles. Substituting be calculated using the following equation of the finite elements
(6) into Equations of , we can give the solution as method [7]:

(11)

(7) where
elements of the total core region;
It is still a linear combination of harmonic components. stacking depth of the core iron;
According to the harmonic balance method, let it multiply by area of the triangle in the transverse ( - ) plane;
and then mass density;
decompose it, so the element of is solved. per unit core loss.
WANG et al.: STUDY OF PARAMETERS OF A TRIPLER USING THE FINITE ELEMENT METHOD OF HARMONIC BALANCE
Fig. 1. Equivalent circuit of a frequency tripler.
IV. MODEL OF LEAKAGE INDUCTANCE CALCULATION
The energy storage concerned with leakage magnetic field
in a transformer is described by short-circuit reactance. In the
laboratory, the leakage reactance and winding resistance of the
transformer are measured by means of the so-called short-circuit
test. In the computer simulation calculation, it only requires that
the primary ampere-turns always exactly equal to the secondary
ampere-turns, but in the opposite direction. Here the leakage
inductance of the transformer can be determined by calculating
the total stored energy [7], [8].
Unfortunately, there is no clear definition of what constitutes
leakage inductance for a magnetic frequency tripler. The opera-
tion state of a tripler is different from a general transformer. Its
primary windings must be applied to rated voltage and the core
is driven into saturation, so the triple harmonic fluxes are pro-
duced and harmonic power is yielded. But when the core is not
enough saturated, the triple harmonic fluxes cannot be produced
and no harmonic power is yielded. It is clear that the leakage in-
ductance of a tripler is a variable value concerned with operating
state. For the electric device operated in a saturation state, the
definition of leakage inductance usually depends on how to use
it [7]. In [3] the equivalent circuit of a tripler is shown as Fig. 1.
In Fig. 1, , and are the 50 Hz three phase voltages
applied to the primary windings. and represent the re-
sistance and reactance of the transmission line. represents
the reactive compensatory capacitance. and are the load
resistance and parallel capacitance. is the turn number of
the primary windings. is the turn number of the secondary
windings. is the conductance to represent the core loss.
and are the resistance to represent the copper loss and the
leakage inductance respectively. Obviously the leakage induc-
tance represents the stored energy, which is not exported in
the windings of tripler during energy conversion.
We use the rated operation state as the base of analysis to
calculate the leakage inductance, therefore the primary and sec-
ondary windings must be applied by rated currents in the sim-
ulation. According to the definition of leakage inductance, the
flux only links with the primary or secondary windings sepa-
rately and without close through the core, which is considered as
the primary or secondary leakage inductance respectively. Be-
sides these, from the view of harmonic decomposition, the mag-
netic energy produced by the triple harmonic flux is exported
through the secondary windings, but the magnetic energy pro-
duced by other harmonic fluxes cannot be exported. Therefore,
the leakage inductance of a tripler must include this part of flux,
791
which is produced by primary winding current and links with
the secondary winding.
The calculation of leakage inductance can be considered from
two basic definitions: one is the flux linkage method and another
is the magnetic stored energy method. Because the vector poten-
tial is solved by HBFEM, we choose flux linkage method.
According to the definition of inductance, the leakage in-
ductances , , have relationship with leakage flux
linkage
(12)
Hence leakage inductance can be calculated through calcu-
lating leakage flux linkage linked with primary and secondary
windings respectively. Here is the total current virtual value
of primary windings; is the third harmonic current virtual
value of secondary windings; represents positive and neg-
ative sequence harmonic current storage energy, is the fun-
damental and fifth harmonic flux linkage which is produced by
primary current and linked with secondary windings and not ex-
ported.
The calculation method of leakage flux linkage can be de-
scribed as follows [7]:
Suppose it is a single-turn coil, the flux linked by this turn
can be defined as the surface integral of flux density over an
area
(13)
This surface integral can be reduced to an integral of vector
potential along a contour enclosing surface
(14)
Because the problem is essentially two-dimensional, the coil
end contribution to the integral in (14) may be ignored. Along
the two long sides of the coil, which lie within the window space
of the core, the vector potential has constant values, say on
the left and on the right. If the length of such a side is ,
then the integral in (14) takes the simple form
(15)
792 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 20, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

Fig. 2. The core configuration and calculation domain of a tripler.

For a thick winding, the cross-sectional area is relative larger,

and the above simple method is not suitable. Suppose the left
and the right sides of a winding have triangular elements re-
spectively in the FEM, the number of right side is 1 to , the
number of left turns is to , then at arbitrary time the
windings linked flux linkages are [9]

Fig. 3. Harmonic flux distribution.

TABLE I
HARMONIC CONTENTS

(16)

where is the cross-sectional area of each turn, which is equal

to the cross-sectional area of the winding side divided by the
turns . Kawaski Steel Work in Japan. Its curve is approximated
produced by positive and negative sequence harmonic by a seventh polynomial
flux linkages can be directly calculated using the above equa-
(18)
tion, but the surface of integration is the area of secondary wind-
ings, and that is: Where the coefficients are determined by the least square fit-
ting method.
(17)

where we assume the right nodes of triangular element is , and (19)

then have the same coordinate values. Other configuration of
triangular element has similar equations. After , and
are solved, the leakage inductances , and of
the tripler may therefore be calculated by using (12).
V. NUMERICAL SIMULATIONS AND EXPEREMENTS RESULTS
A. Numerical Simulations
Magnetic frequency tripler is composed of three single-phase
transformers with star-connected primary windings and the
open delta-connected secondary windings and is driven deep
into saturation. All the single-phase transformer’s operational
states are identical, and therefore we only need to analyze one
transformer.
The experimental single phase transformers are constructed
by placing a pair of windings around the center leg of a magnetic
core, as indicated in Fig. 2. The windings are placed over each
other, with the primary winding nearer the core center. The de-
sign capacity is 6 kW. The domain for calculation is also shown
in Fig. 2.
In this study, the tripler uses 0.35 mm grain oriented plasma
lamination steel core typed 35RG135, which is made by the
In order to plot conveniently, simulation calculation includes
the entire region of the tripler. The numbers of nodes and tri-
angle element are 323 and 576 respectively.
The parameters for the calculation of no-load core losses are
given as follows:
(20)
During the calculation we set magnetic vector potential of
four boundary to be zero. Fig. 3 shows the equi-potential lines
of the harmonics at phase respectively. For clearly
seeing, the values of the third and fifth harmonics are enlarged
by 3 and 5 times respectively. From Fig. 3 it is clear that in this
core construction, the flux density in the center leg is highly
saturated, but the flux densities in the two side yoke is still in
the linear region.
Each harmonic contents of one element in the center leg and
side yoke are given in Table I.
After the harmonic contents of flux density in the total iron
are solved, core losses can be computed by the equations in
WANG et al.: STUDY OF PARAMETERS OF A TRIPLER USING THE FINITE ELEMENT METHOD OF HARMONIC BALANCE
TABLE II
COMPUTED RESULTS OF THE CORE LOSSES (W)
TABLE III
MEASURED AND CALCULATION VALUES OF LEAKAGE INDUCTANCE
TABLE IV
MEASURED VALUES OF LOSSES AT NO-LOAD EXPERIMENT
Section III. For the sinusoidal part, the core loss is computed
using (11), then the loss is corrected using correction factors
(9) and (10) to obtain the total core losses due to the distorted
waveforms of flux density. The computation results of the core
losses are show in Table II. From Table II, we can see that both
hysteresis and eddy current losses are notablely increased when
the harmonic content are considered.
The ampere-turns for the simulation calculation of leakage
inductance adopts the values measured by experiment, where
, , and other
components are zeros. During the calculation we set magnetic
vector potential of four boundaries to be zero. The frequency
of primary input is 50 Hz; the frequency of secondary output is
150 Hz.
By using the above leakage inductance calculation method
and under the above boundary condition, the leakage inductance
values are calculated as shown in Table III.
B. Experiments of a Tripler
The purpose of the no-load experiments is to measure core
losses and excitation inductance. If the primary winding is ex-
cited at the rated voltage value and the secondary winding is
open in an experiment of general transformer, the measured loss
is considered as core loss because the excitation current value is
small. In the experiment of tripler, the primary winding must be
excited at the rated voltage value, so that the excitation current
value will be several times greater than the general transformer.
It should be noted that the measured losses have not only the
core loss but also the copper loss. If the copper loss can be calcu-
lated separately, then the core loss can be obtained respectively.
The measured values of loss for one excitation current are sum-
marized in Table IV, which was measured with a precise power
harmonic measuring instrument —3195 POWER HITESTER
(made in Japan).
793
In Table IV, the no-load current value approaches its rated
current value. Based on the measured loss values and current
values, the copper losses can be solved respectively according
to equal copper resistance, and then the core losses are also ob-
tained, it is 126.6 W. Comparing 126.6 W of Table IV with
139.3 W of Table II, the values of core losses calculated are 1.1
times higher than the measured values, this may be a result of
copper resistance measurement error and the difference between
simulation calculation current values and experiment. But it val-
idates that the saturated core losses calculation method proposed
in this paper is corrected. In addition, it shows that copper loss
is greater than the core loss when the excited current is high,
so the copper loss should be decreased in the future design of a
magnetic frequency tripler.
Based on the equivalent circuit in Fig. 1, the leakage induc-
tance of a tripler may be determined by using the method of ex-
perimental measurement. According to Thevenin’s theorem, the
inner impedance is taken as the value of the open-circuit voltage
divided by short-circuits current at the rated voltage. The value
of the inner impedance is
(21)
where is the equivalent copper loss resistance, which can be
determined by materials used, and
(22)
where the leakage inductance is shown as ; is
the frequency of the third harmonic.
The equivalent inductance values of experimental measure-
ment are given in Table III.
From the results of calculation in Table III, we can see that the
leakage inductance which is produced by primary winding
current and links with the secondary windings is larger than
the leakage inductances and which only link with the
primary and secondary windings respectively and do not close
through the core. is the primary part of the equivalent
leakage inductance of the tripler. To summarize, the leakage in-
ductance values calculated by using the above method agrees
with the measured values in experiment.
In the experiment the maximal output power is obtained by
using matching load resistance, which is determined based on
the equivalent inner impedance. The two-winding tripler rated
output power 6 kW has been obtained with the efficiency up to
92.5%. This result indicates the promising future for optimizing
design and improving efficiency.
VI. CONCLUSION
In this paper, a harmonic balance finite element method is
developed and used to compute the parameters of a tripler. The
core losses of a saturated core and an equivalent leakage reac-
tance model of a magnetic frequency tripler are presented based
on HBFEM. As an example, a tripler of 6 kW rated capacity is
calculated and measured. The results of simulation are consis-
tent with experiment results and thus illustrate the correctness of
the proposed method. It provides an effective analysis method
for getting equivalent circuit parameters of a tripler.
794 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 20, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

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