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US 7,327,123 B2Granted
Controller for AC generator
AssigneeMagnetic Applications, Inc.
InventorsIra S. Faberman, Stewart C. Koch, Charles Y. Lafontaine, Dave E. Williams, Harold C. Scott
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A control system that can accommodate the wide variations in the output of a generator, such as a permanent magnet alternator, while providing an output with relatively uniform phase ripple. The control system includes a zero crossing detector and variable ramp generator for generating control signals to a switching rectifier to generate a regulated DC signal.
Claims7
A system, responsive to at least one phase of an AC signal, for generating control signals to a switching rectifier to generate a regulated DC signal, the system comprising:
- a zero crossing detector, responsive to a first signal representative of the AC phase, for generating indicia of zero crossings in the AC phase;
- a variable ramp generator, responsive to a second signal representative of the AC phase and the indicia of zero crossings, for generating a ramp signal indicative of the time integral of the voltage of the AC phase accumulated from the occurrence of a zero crossing and reset upon the occurrence of the next successive zero crossing;
- a trigger signal generator, responsive to the time integral ramp signal and a reference signal indicative of a desired firing angle to maintain a set DC output, for generating the control signals to the switching rectifier in accordance with a comparison of the time integral ramp signal to the reference signal.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.