Fabrication Aspects and Switching Performance of a Self-Sensing 800 V SiC Circuit Breaker Device

This work presents the switching performance of a novel solid-state circuit breaker device suitable for DC-applications up to 800 V. These "dual thyristor" devices are manufactured employing a 4H-SiC JFET technology. With respect to scalability, the influence of specific design parameters on the quasi-static output characteristics are discussed along with corresponding fabrication aspects. In order to investigate the switching performance, clamped and unclamped inductive switching (CIS and UIS) experiments at up to 800 V are carried out. In case of CIS, current clearance is achieved within 642 ns after the self-sensed trigger event at 1.75 A. The UIS experiments reveal stable current handling capability during avalanche.

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