The Boeing Company

Thomas H Lynch

Thomas A Hertel

Erich H Soendker

James A Hartung

Brian Koch

Robert Kezerian Wilde

John Keith Branom

A high-temperature, regulated power supply uses wide band gap transistors to drive a Royer circuit. Pulses output from the Royer circuit are gated through a pulse width modulator to control the duty cycle of wide band gap transistors that drive an output transformer. The output of the transformer is rectified and filtered to provide the regulated D.C. output voltage. Regulation is accomplished by sampling the output voltage, comparing it to a reference voltage and using the difference between the output voltage and the reference voltage to control the pulse width modulator. High temperature operability is provided by using wide band gap transistors and iron or steel core transformers. This technique also provides a radiation hard assembly.

High temperature power supply

A system and method for controlling a thermal dynamic cycle engine, such as a Stirling engine. The system includes a controller able to execute a program to alter certain aspects of the system to provide for a maximum power transfer and substantially stall free start up of the thermal dynamic cycle engine. Generally the controller is able to alter the current load to achieve a selected stroke length, pattern or temperature of a heater head of the engine. The system allows for generally stall free start-up and continuous control for maximum power (with maximum power factor) transfer from the thermal cycle engine or the associated alternator.

Thermal cycle engine boost bridge power interface

An improved string switching apparatus and method is provided for controllably connecting a plurality of solar array strings to an output power bus. The string switching apparatus can include a plurality of field effect transistors electrically connected in parallel with respective solar array strings and a digital controller for controllably switching the field effect transistors between on and off states to thereby control the power level of the output power bus. The field effect transistors can be switched between an on state in which the output of the respective solar array string is shunted and an off state in which the output of the respective solar array string is delivered to the output power bus. In addition to merely providing power to an output power bus, the string switching apparatus and method can controllably connect the plurality of solar array strings to either an output power bus or an auxiliary power bus, such as a battery charging power bus. In addition to the plurality of shunt regulators, the string switching apparatus can include a plurality of coupling switches electrically connected between respective solar array strings and one of the output power bus and the auxiliary power bus for controllably directing the power to a selected one of the power buses.

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Chatsworth, CA, United States of America

Thomas H Lynch