Voltage Control in Inverters

(PWM)
MODULE-5

Prepared by
LEKSHMI NAIR K B
Assistant Professor
Department of EEE
Mohandas College of Engineering and Technology
 Performance parameters of Inverters
• Output of Inverter is not a sine wave. It consists of
fundamental plus certain harmonics
• Harmonics leads to poor performance of load and
reduced system efficiency
• Lower is the harmonic content in output waveform,
better is the quality of inverter
• The performance parameter to evaluate quality of
inverter are:

(a) Harmonic factor of n-th harmonic

(b) Total Harmonic Distortion
(c) Distortion factor
(a) Harmonic factor of n-th harmonic
 (b) Total Harmonic Distortion

• It is a measure of waveform distortion

• Lower the THD, lower is the distortion in voltage/current waveform and
more closer is the waveform to sine wave
(c) Distortion factor
Voltage control in single phase Inverters

The various methods for the control of output

voltage of inverters are

• External control of ac output voltage

• External control of dc input voltage
• Internal control of inverters
 External control of ac output voltage
Two possible methods of external control of ac output
voltage obtained from inverter terminals are
1. AC voltage control
2. Series-inverter control
1. AC voltage control

• The voltage input to the ac load is regulated through

firing angle control of ac voltage regulator
• This method give rise to higher harmonic content in
output voltage
• Rarely used except for low power applications
 2. Series-inverter control

Phasor sum of two fundamental voltages

gives resultant fundamental voltage

• Two or more inverters are used in series

• Inverter output is fed to two transformers whose secondaries are
connected in series
• Both the two voltages must have the same frequency
• Angle can be varied by firing angle control of the two inverters
• This method will not add harmonics to the output voltage
 External control of dc input voltage

• If the available voltage source is ac, then dc input to the inverter

is controlled through a fully controlled rectifier, uncontrolled
rectifier and chopper, ac voltage controller and uncontrolled
rectifier
• If the available voltage source is dc, then a chopper may be used
 External control of dc input voltage
• Advantages

Disadv

Disadvantages
 Internal control of Inverters
• Output voltage from inverter is adjusted by
exercising a control within the inverter.
• Most efficient method-Pulse width Modulation
(PWM)
Pulse width Modulation
• Fixed dc input given to inverter
• Controlled ac output voltage is obtained by
adjusting on-off periods of inverter components
Advantages & Disadvantages
 Different PWM techniques
• Single-pulse modulation
• Multiple-pulse modulation
• Sinusoidal-pulse modulation
• The three PWM techniques differ from each other in
harmonic content in output voltage. Choice of method
depends on harmonic content permissible in the output
voltage
PWM techniques
Single-pulse modulation
 Single-pulse modulation
• There is only one pulse per half cycle and width of the
pulse is varied to control the inverter output voltage
• Gating signal is generated by comparing a rectangular
reference signal (ER) with a triangular carrier wave (Ec)
• The fundamental frequency of output voltage is
determined by frequency of reference signal.
• Pulse width P can be varied from 0 to 180 by varying ER
from 0 to Ec
• Amplitude modulation index, M = (ER/Ec)
Single-pulse modulation
Single-pulse modulation
Single-pulse modulation
 Single-pulse modulation

• In this type of voltage control scheme, a great

deal of harmonics are introduced in the output
voltage, particularly at low output voltage
Harmonic content in SPWM
Multiple Pulse Width Modulation
 Multiple Pulse Width Modulation
(Symmetrical PWM)
• In this method harmonic content is reduced using several
pulses in each half cycle of output voltage.
• Gating signals for thyristors are produced by comparing
reference signal with triangular carrier wave
• Carrier frequency (fc) determines the number of cycles
per half-cycle and frequency of reference signal sets the
output frequency (fo)
• Frequency modulation ratio , mf= (fc/fo)
• Number of pulses per half cycle, Np= (mf/2)
• Variation of M from 0 to 1 varies pulse width from
• ( /Np )and output voltage from 0 to E dc
 Multiple Pulse Width Modulation
(Symmetrical PWM)
• As the number of pulses per half cycle is increased,
lower order harmonics are reduced.

• This method is preferred over SPWM because

voltage control can be achieved with simultaneous
reduction of lower order harmonics

• But switching losses are more in MPWM due to

frequent turn on and off of thyristors.
Multiple Pulse Width Modulation
Multiple Pulse Width Modulation
Multiple Pulse Width Modulation
Multiple Pulse Width Modulation
Multiple Pulse Width Modulation
 Sinusoidal Pulse width Modulation
• Several pulses per half cycle are used as that of MPWM
• Width of all pulses are not same. Width of pulses are
varied proportional to the amplitude of the sine wave
evaluated at the center of the same pulse
• Here gating signal is produced by comparing a
sinusoidal reference signal with a triangular carrier wave
• Inverter output frequency is determined by frequency of
reference signal.
• RMS value of output voltage and modulation index, M is
determined by peak amplitude of the reference signal.
• Number of pulses per half cycle is determined by carrier
frequency
 Sinusoidal Pulse width Modulation
• When sinusoidal wave has a magnitude higher than
the triangular wave, the comparator output is high.
• If peak of triangular wave coincide with zero of
reference sinusoid, there are (N=fc/2f) pulses per
half cycle.
• If zero of triangular wave coincide with zero of
reference sinusoid, then (N-1) pulses per half cycle
• The ratio (ER/Ec) is called modulation index, M
•
Sinusoidal Pulse width Modulation
 Sinusoidal Pulse width Modulation
Modulation index:
RMS VALUE OF OUTPUT VOLTAGE
Np=5

Np=4