Electronic – Dead time effects Of IGBTs

induction motormotor controller

I'm working on a project to control single phase ac induction motor in which I planned to use two IGBTs, one for switching the PWM to the motor (for AC chopping, PWM frequency is fixed @16khz) and one for freewheeling the motor. A symbolic circuit is included here:

Schematic

I know the dead time of IGBTs is going to have some effect on the system. I want to know how worst the system is going to be effected because of this dead time and what are the remedies with respect to hardware and software.

What will happen if i completely ignore the dead time?

Best Answer

You wouldn't hook up the IGBTs like that; IGBTs are transistors and don't switch AC. You want a single phase h-bridge:

schematic

simulate this circuit – Schematic created using CircuitLab

The "Battery" is your source power; it usually comes from a rectifier bank with a bunch of capacitance. A freewheeling circuit could be implemented with an SCR across the motor leads but more usually in these types of designs as with a fifth IGBT which connects the battery to a big resistor. You turn on two of the h-bridge IGBTs and turn on the regen IGBT as necessary to keep the bus voltage from riding up too high.

Now you generate an AC waveform by PWMing Q1/Q4 for one half and Q3/Q2 for the other half.

Dead time is an enforced "all transistors off" period which is used to ensure that Q1 and Q2 are never on at the same time. If both halves of one side of the bridge (Q1/Q2 or Q3/Q4) are on, you get a huge current spike through the affected transistors. Ignoring dead time might work as long as your supply is not too stiff and your devices are over-specc'd, but it's certainly not recommended.