Power module with solid state circuit breakers for fault-tolerant applications

Due to safety reasons in some applications and especially in aerospace applications a fail safe operability is crucial. One solution for this operability is redundancy but size, weight and costs are doubled. Another approach is to design a fault tolerant system which ensures the fail safe operability. This paper describes the design of a fault tolerant system for a drive application. The fault tolerant inverter consists of four phase legs, three phase legs for the conventional inverter topology and a redundant one. Additionally there are solid state circuit breakers in the system in order to minimize the conduction losses during operation. In order to minimize the switching losses during normal operation newest IGBT and silicon carbide diodes are used. Two phase legs with circuit breakers are integrated in one power module. Due to the enhanced functionality the modules are called Enhanced Intelligent Power Modules (EIPM). Two of these power modules are used for the fault tolerant inverter topology. The results, simulations and first measurements are shown in order to demonstrate the functionality of the system. This work was done in the European funded project MOET together with Airbus.