Teco-westinghouse Motor Company

Thomas Keister

Enrique Ledezma

Ryan Edwards

Alex Skorcz

Mehdi T Abolhassani

Randall E Pipho

Srinivas Satumahanti

Devdatta P Kulkarni

Haran Chandra Karmaker

Chao Hsu Liao

Bhaskara Palle

Manzoor Hussain

Ut V Pham

Kaiyu Wang

Scott Simmons

Rose Craft

In an embodiment, a power converter includes: a plurality of power amplifier units, each having: a plurality of slice each with a power conversion module including an AC/DC/AC converter; a mains controller to control the plurality of slices; and a feedback conditioning system coupled to the mains controller; a plurality of input contactors and a plurality of output contactors via which each of the plurality of power amplifier units is to couple between a transformer and a load; and a master controller coupled to the plurality of power amplifier units.

Modular configurable multi-megawatt power amplifier

In one embodiment, a power cell chamber for a drive system includes moveable and fixed portions. The moveable portion includes a rectifier stage to rectify an input signal received from a secondary winding of a transformer to provide a rectified signal and an inverter stage having a plurality of switching devices to receive a DC signal and output an AC signal. This moveable portion can be slidably adapted within a cabinet of the drive system. In turn, the fixed portion includes a DC link having at least one capacitor to receive the rectified signal and provide the DC signal to the inverter stage.

Pluggable power cell for an inverter

In an example embodiment, a cooling system is a pumpless passive system, and includes a cold plate configured to receive a flow of liquid coolant and to output a flow of vapor phase coolant, where the cold plate includes at least one heat pipe adapted therein to provide for transfer of the liquid coolant to the vapor phase coolant, a first connection member coupled to the at least one heat pipe, a first conduit coupled to the first connection member, the first conduit extending vertically to enable at least the vapor phase coolant to travel through the first conduit, and a heat exchanger located above and coupled to the first conduit, where the heat exchanger is to transfer the vapor phase coolant to the liquid coolant.

Passive two phase cooling solution for low, medium and high voltage drive systems

In an embodiment, a drive system includes a transformer enclosed in an enclosure including a heat exchanger to cool a fluid medium. In addition, the system includes a plurality of power cubes each including a rectifier, a DC-link, and an inverter. Each power cube may include a plurality of cold plates each coupled to a corresponding switching device of the inverter, an inlet port in communication with a first one of the plurality of cold plates and an outlet port in communication with a last one of the plurality of cold plates. In turn, a manifold assembly is to couple at least the power cubes to enable two phase cooling of the power cubes and the transformer via one or more heat exchangers.

Cooling arrangements for drive systems

In an embodiment, a medium voltage drive system includes a transformer, multiple power cubes each coupled to the transformer, and a manifold assembly. Each power cube includes cold plates each coupled to a corresponding switching device of the cube, an inlet port in communication with a first one of the cold plates and an outlet port in communication with a last one of the cold plates. The manifold assembly can support an inlet conduit and an outlet conduit and further support first and second connection members to enable blind mating of each of the first connection members to the inlet port of one of the power cubes and each of the second connection members to the outlet port of one of the power cubes to enable two phase cooling of the plurality of power cubes.

Providing a cooling system for a medium voltage drive system

A control system may be provided for a controlled system such as a drive or inverter system. To provide for control in such system, a master controller may be present to receive, via a second communication protocol from a cabinet controller coupled to the master controller, status information of a controlled device, generate control information based at least in part on the status information, and transmit the control information to the cabinet controller via the second communication protocol. In turn, the cabinet controller can generate and communicate a control packet to the controlled device via a first communication protocol. This packet can be interleaved within another message communicated from the cabinet controller to the device.

Providing multiple communication protocols for a control system having a master controller and a slave controller

In one embodiment, a system may include multiple transformers each to provide an output to one or more power cells, where the power cells provide AC power to a load. Each transformer may have at least one primary winding and multiple secondary windings, where the primary winding of each transformer is phase shifted with respect to its neighboring transformers and the secondary windings are also phase shifted. The phase shift of the primary winding can be based on the phase shift of the secondary windings and a number of the plurality of transformers.

Modular multi-pulse transformer rectifier for use in symmetric multi-level power converter

In one embodiment, a medium voltage drive system includes at least one transformer and multiple power cell chambers each coupled to a transformer. The power cell chambers each may include a rectifier, a DC-link, and an inverter. Each power cell chamber can be separated into fixed and moveable portions, where the moveable portion includes the rectifier and the inverter and the fixed portion includes the DC-link. A power service bus can couple the fixed and moveable portions of each power cell chamber and couple in series groups of the plurality of power cell chambers.

Providing modular power conversion

A transformer module includes a main primary winding coupled to a first input power source to receive a medium voltage signal, multiple main secondary windings each to couple to a power cell of a drive system, and an auxiliary primary winding coupled to a second input power source to receive a low voltage signal. The auxiliary primary winding can be spatially separated from the main windings to increase leakage inductance. The auxiliary primary winding can be active during a pre-charge operation to pre-charge the power cells.

Pre-charging an inverter using an auxiliary winding

In one embodiment, the present invention includes a medium voltage drive system having multiple power cells each to couple between a transformer and a load. A first subset of the power cells are configured to provide power to the load and to perform partial regeneration from the load, and a second subset of the power cells are configured to provide power to the load but not perform partial regeneration. A controller may be included in the system to simultaneously control a DC bus voltage of at least one of the first subset of the power cells, correct a power factor of the system, and provide harmonic current compensation for the system.

Partial regeneration in a multi-level power inverter

In one embodiment, the present invention includes a turbine to generate mechanical energy from kinetic energy, a generator coupled to the turbine to receive the mechanical energy and to output multiple isolated supply powers, and multiple power stages each coupled to the generator. Each of the power stages may receive at least one of the isolated supply powers.

Growing community of inventors

Georgetown, TX, United States of America

Thomas Keister