IGBT model validation

Efforts to model the switching behavior of IGBTs have been greatly expanded. In many cases, circuit modeling has become an economic necessity because the cost of the components of a medium- to high-power circuit, and the load itself, is so high that all means available muse be used to lower the risk of system failure during both the prototyping phase of product development and production. As the physics that govern transistor behavior are quite complex, attempts at accurately predicting the details of transistor switching performance tax models to their extreme. Test procedures are needed to check the validity of predictions made by various models, and these procedures need to be applicable to commonly used circuits. It is particularly important that these test procedures are built around a test-bed that is well understood and well characterized so that the device model is given the correct information for the simulations. The details of a suitable test bed circuit that can be used for model-verification-related measurements on half bridge configured IGBTs are given. The NIST/IEEE Working Group on Model Validation has been established to address the need for testing the validity of various models as they relate to predicting the behavior of devices under realistic conditions. The work described in this article is performed, in part, to support the needs of the IGBT task of the Working Group.