Power converter performing evaporative cooling of a switching element
AssigneeMitsubishi Electric Corporation
InventorsTetsuo Sugahara, Tomohiro Kobayashi, Ryosuke Nakagawa
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Abstract
A power converter, which performs cooling of a switching element by using a boiling cooling apparatus that makes use of a boiling phenomenon of a coolant incorporated therein, includes a control unit to control an operation of the power converter based on a deviation between an element attachment surface temperature, which is a temperature of an attachment surface of the switching element, and a cooling apparatus intake air temperature. When the deviation between the element attachment surface temperature and the cooling apparatus intake air temperature exceeds a predetermined threshold, the control unit performs control of stopping the power converter.
Claims17
A power converter converting input direct-current power or alternating-current power into desired alternating-current power according to a switching operation of a switching element to output the desired alternating-current power, and performing cooling of the switching element by using a cooling apparatus that makes use of a boiling phenomenon of a coolant incorporated therein, the power converter comprising:
- a control unit controlling an operation of the power converter based on a deviation between a temperature of the switching element or an attachment surface of the switching element and a temperature of cooling air sucked by the cooling apparatus,
- wherein the control unit includes a detecting unit generating and outputting a cooling performance deterioration detection signal representing performance deterioration of the cooling apparatus when the deviation exceeds a predetermined threshold.
A power converter converting input direct-current power or alternating-current power into desired alternating-current power according to a switching operation of a switching element to output the desired alternating-current power, and perform cooling of the switching element by using a cooling apparatus that makes use of a boiling phenomenon of a coolant incorporated therein, the power converter comprising:
- a control unit controlling an operation of the power converter based on a deviation between a temperature during operation and a temperature before an operation start of the switching element or an attachment surface of the switching element,
- wherein the control unit includes a detecting unit generating and outputting a cooling performance deterioration detection signal representing performance deterioration of the cooling apparatus when the deviation exceeds a predetermined threshold, and
- wherein the detecting unit includes a threshold generating unit that generates the threshold based on a loss of the switching element such that the threshold is smaller when the loss of the switching element is large than when the loss of the switching element is small.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.