Open AccessHigh‐performance bi‐directional Z ‐source inverter for locomotive drive application
Author(s) -
Vijayan Vasanthi,
Ashok S.
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
iet electrical systems in transportation
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.588
H-Index - 26
eISSN - 2042-9746
pISSN - 2042-9738
DOI - 10.1049/iet-est.2014.0053
Subject(s) - inverter , voltage , engineering , electrical engineering , z source inverter , transformer , traction (geology) , automotive engineering , control theory (sociology) , computer science , mechanical engineering , control (management) , artificial intelligence
Three‐phase locomotives use voltage source inverter technology for the speed control of traction motors. The voltage source inverter is fed by single phase active front end converter connected in H bridge in the locomotives. Since the voltage source inverter works in buck mode, a higher DC‐link voltage is required to provide the rated voltage of traction motors increasing the size and cost of system. This study proposes a high‐performance bi‐directional Z ‐source inverter instead of voltage source inverter. Analysis is performed in all regions of operation of locomotive drive‐acceleration, free running and regenerative braking. Both the speed control techniques‐variable voltage variable frequency and field weakening are used for the drives. Simulation study of the system shows that the DC‐link voltage gets reduced by 39% which in turn lower the voltage stress. This will decrease the traction transformer output voltage. Reduction in the harmonics at the output of Z ‐source inverter by 16% reduces the overheating of traction motor drive. A small scale prototype of Z ‐source inverter fed drive is made in the laboratory to verify the performance obtained from the simulation.