DC To AC

Conversion.

INVERTERS

Inverters

DEFINITION: Converts DC to AC power by switching

the DC input voltage (or current) in a pre-determined

sequence so as to generate AC voltage (or current)
output.

TYPICAL APPLICATIONS:

UPS, Industrial drives, Traction, HVDC

General block diagram

variable DC link

DC link voltage is varied by a DC-to DC converter or controlled

rectifier.

Generate square wave output voltage.

Output voltage amplitude is varied as DC link is varied.

Frequency of output voltage is varied by changing the frequency of

the square wave pulses.

Advantages:

simple waveform generation

Reliable

Disadvantages:

Extra conversion stage

Poor harmonics

VSI with fixed DC link

DC voltage is held constant.
Output voltage amplitude and frequency are varied
simultaneously using PWM technique.
Good harmonic control, but at the expense of complex
waveform generation.

Current Source Inverter (CSI)

Input (DC) current is chopped to obtain AC output
current.
Need large L.
Less popular compared to VSI.

Power flow consideration

Assume load is drawing lagging
Power Factor.:
(+) io and (+) vo:
flow (1)

(+) power

(-) io and (-) vo:

flow (3)

(+) power

(+) io and (-) vo:

flow (2)

(-) power

(-) io and (+) vo:

flow (4)

(-) power

Four quadrant operation

Negative power flow indicates that the
power is fed back from load to source.
Hence, inverter must have 4
quadrant
capability to cater for all possible load
types.
Practically, this can be achieved by
placing an antiparallel diode across each
switching device.

Classification

According to the nature of input source

Voltage source inverters (VSI)
Current source inverters (CSI)
In case of VSI, the input to the inverter is provided by
ripple free dc voltage source whereas in CSI, the voltage
source is first converted into a current source and then
used to supply the power to the inverter.

According to the Waveshape of the Output

Voltage

Square-wave inverter
Quasi-square wave inverter
Pulse-width modulated (PWM) inverters

Types of inverter

Voltage Source Inverter (VSI)

Current Source Inverter (CSI)

Thyristor Inverter Classification

According to the Method of Commutation
Line commutated inverters
Forced commutated inverters

Line Commutated Inverters:

In case of a.c. circuits, a.c. line voltage is
available across the device.
When the current in the SCR goes through a
natural zero, the device will turned-off.
This process is known as natural commutation
process and the inverters based on this
principle are known as line commutated
inverters.

Forced Commutated Inverters:

In case of d.c. circuits, since the supply voltage
does not go through the zero point, some external
source is required to commutate the device.
This process is known as the forced commutation
process and the inverters based on this principle
are called as forced commutated inverters.
As the device is to be commutated forcefully,
these types of inverters require complicated
commutation circuitries.
These inverters are further classified as:
(i) Auxiliary commutated inverters
(ii) Complementary commutated inverters

According to Connections:
Series inverters
Parallel inverters
Bridge inverters
Bridge inverters are further classified as:

(i) Half-bridge
(ii) Full-bridge

SINGLE-PHASE HALF-BRIDGE VOLTAGE-SOURCE

INVERTERS

Switches S1 and S2 are the gate commutated

devices such as power BJTs, MOSFETs, GTO, IGBT,

MCT, etc..
When closed, these switches conducts and current
flows in the direction of arrow.

Operation with Resistive Load

The operation of the circuit can be divided
into two periods:
Period-I, where switch S1 is conducting from 0
to T/2
Period-II, where switch S2 is conducting from
T/2 to T
where T= 1/f and f is the frequency of the
output voltage waveform

Voltage and Current waveforms for Resistive load

Switch S1 is closed for half-time period (T/2) of the desired ac

output
It connects point p of the dc source to point A and the output
voltage eo becomes equal to +Edc/2
At t = T/2, gating signal is removed from S1 and it turns-off
For the next halftime period (T/2 < t < T), the gating signal is
given to S2
It connects point N of the dc source to point A and the output
voltage reverses
Thus, by closing S1 and S2 alternately, for half-time periods, a
square-wave ac voltage is obtained at the output
With resistive load, waveshape of load current is identical to that
of output voltage
By controlling the time periods of the gate-drive signals, the
frequency can be varied. Here diodes D1 and D2 do not play any
role
The voltage across the switch when it is OFF is Edc
Gating circuit should be designed Such that switches S1 and S2
should not turn-on at the same time.

Circuit Analysis
Average Output Voltage
E0 av

e ( t )d t 0
0

RMS of Output Voltage

E0 RMS

1
2

Edc
e ( t )d t
2
2
0

Harmonics

Fourier Series
Study of harmonics requires understanding of wave
shapes. Fourier Series is a tool to analyse wave shapes.
Fourier Series:

Inverse Fourier :

Harmonics of square-wave

when n is even, cos n = 1 ; bn=0

when n is odd, cos n = -1

Spectra of square wave

Spectra (harmonics) characteristics:

Harmonic decreases as n increases.
It decreases with a factor of (1/n).
Even harmonics are absent
Nearest harmonics is the 3rd.
If fundamental is 50Hz, then nearest harmonic is 150Hz.
Due to the small separation between the fundamental
and harmonics, output low-pass filter design can be
quite difficult.

Instantaneous Output-Voltage
The Fourier-series can be obtained by using
the following equation

e0 t

n 1,2,3...

where Cn an2 bn2

and

and

an

Cn sin nt n

and n tan 1 an bn

e t cos nt dt 0 ,
0

1
bn

e t sin nt dt
0

due to square wave symmetry

Due to quarter-wave symmetry, bn= 0 for all even n.

and

4
bn

2 Edc
bn
,
n

/2

Edc
sin nt d t for all odd ' n '
2

for odd value of n.

2 Edc
Cn a b
n
2
n

2
n

and n tan 1 an bn 0

Therefore, the instantaneous output voltage of a

half-bridge inverter can be expressed in Fourierseries form as:

2 Edc
e0 t
sin nt
n 1,3,5... n
0,

for n 2, 4, 6.......(even values of n)

The nth harmonic-component is given by

e0 ( n )

Cn
2

2 Edc
n 2

2 Edc
for
n

n 1, 3, 5....

RMS value of fundamental components is

E1 RMS

Edc 0.45 Edc

Switch (Device) Voltage and Current

Ratings
V E
CE 0

DC

The current waveform for switch is a squarewave with a peak value of Edc/2R.
ITavg

IT RMS

T 2

IT Peak

Edc
Edc
dt
2R
4R

T 2

Edc
Edc
2 R dt
2 2R

Edc
2R

Operation with RL Load

With an inductive-load, the output voltage

waveform is similar to that with a resistiveload, however the load-current cannot change
immediately with the output voltage
The operation of half-bridge inverter with RL
load is divided into four distinct modes
D1 and D2 are known as the feedback diodes

Mode I (t1 < t < t2):

S1 is turned-on at instant tl, the load voltage is equal to
+Edc/2 and the positive load current increases gradually
At instant t2, the load current reaches the peak value
Switch S1 is turned-off at this instant
Due to same-polarity of load voltage and load current, the
energy is stored by the load
Mode II (t2 < t < t3):
Due to inductive-load, the load current direction will be
maintained even-after S1 is turned-off
The self-induced voltage in the load will be negative. The
load current flows through lower half of the supply and D2
In this mode, the stored energy in load is fed back to the
lower half of the source and the load voltage is clamped to
-Edc/2.

Mode III (t3 < t < t4):

At instant t3, the load-current goes to zero, indicating that a1
the stored energy, has been returned back to the lower half of
supply
At instant t3, S2 is turned-on
This will produce a negative load voltage eo = - Edc/2 and a
negative load current
Load current reaches a negative peak at the end of this interval
Mode IV (to < t < t1):
Switch S2 is turned-off at instant t4. The self induced voltage in
the inductive load will maintain the load current
The load voltage changes its polarity to become positive Edc/2,
load current remains negative and the stored energy in the load
is returned back to the upper half of the dc source
At t5, the load current goes to 0 and S1 can be turned-on
again. This cycle of operation repeats.

Operating

Circuit-Equations
Instantaneous Current io:
i0 ( t )

n 1,3,5..

2 Edc
n R ( n L)
2

n L

n tan 1

Z n R 2 ( n L)2

sin( n t n )

Fundamental Output Power

P1 = E1RMS I1RMS cos 1 = I1RMS2 R

E1RMS = RMS value of fundamental output voltage
I1RMS = RMS value of fundamental output current

1 tan 1 L / R

2 Edc

I1RMS

P1RMS I

2
1RMS

R ( L)
2

2 Edc

2 R 2 ( L) 2

4 E 2 dc R
2 E 2 dc R
2 2
2 2
2
2 R ( L) R 2 L2

Cross Conduction or Shoot through

Fault
In the half-bridge inverter circuit, each switch conducts

for a period of T/2 sec

At any particular instant, one switch is turned-on and

the other is turned-off

However,

the outgoing switch does not

instantaneously due to its finite turn-off delay

turn-off

Due to this, both switches (incoming and outgoing)

conduct simultaneously for a short-time. This is known

as cross-conduction or shoot through-fault

Cross Conduction or Shoot through Fault

When both switches conducts simultaneously, the input DC

supply is short circuited and with this switches get damaged.

Cross conduction can be avoided by allowing the outgoing

switch to turn-off completely first and then applying the gatedrive to the incoming device
A dead-band or delay is introduced between the trailing-edge

of the base-drive of outgoing device and the leading-edge of

the base-drive of the incoming device. Therefore, during the
dead-band interval, no device receives base-drive .
Hence, the dead-band should be longer than the turnoff time

of the power-devices used in the inverter circuit.

Problem1.

The single-phase half-bridge inverter has a resistive load of

10 Ohm. and the centre-tap DC input voltage is 96 V. Compute:
(i) RMS value of the output voltage.
(ii) Fundamental component of the output voltage waveform.
(iii) First five harmonics of the output-voltage waveform.
(iv) Fundamental power consumed by the load.
(v) RMS power consumed by the load.
(vi) Verify that the rms value determined by harmonic
summation method is nearly equal to the value determined by
integration method.

SINGLE-PHASE FULL-BRIDGE INVERTERS

inverter

EQUIVALENT CIRCUIT

S1,S2 ON;

S3,S4 OFF

for t1 < t < t2

Waveforms and harmonics of squarewave inverter

S3,S4 ON ;

S1,S2

OFF

for

t2 < t < t3

The inverter uses two pairs of controlled switches

(S1,S2 and S3,S4) and two pairs of diodes (D1,D2

and D3,D4) Switch can be SCR, BJT, MOSFET, IGBT
etc..
The devices of one pair operate simultaneously
In order to compose a positive voltage (+ Eo) across

the load, switches S1 and S2 are turned-on

simultaneously whereas to have a negative voltage (Eo) across the load, we need to turn-on the switches
S3 and S4
Diodes D1, D2, D3 and D4 are known as the

feedback diodes functional only with reactive loads.

Operation with Resistive Load

The bridge-inverter operates in two-modes in one-cycle of
the output.
Mode-I (0 < t < T/2):
In this mode, switches S1 and S2 conducts simultaneously.
The load voltage is +Edc and load current flows from P to
Q.
At t = T/2, S1 and S2 are turned-off and S3 and S4 are
turned-on
Mode-II (T/2 < t < T):
At t = T/2, switches S3 and S4 are turned-on and S1 and
S2 are turned-off
The load voltage is - Edc and load current flows from Q to P
At t = T, S3 and S4 are turned-off and S1 and S2 are
turned-on again
As the load is resistive, it does not store any energy.
Therefore, feedback diodes are not effective here.

Equivalent Circuit

Circuit-Analysis
The analysis of the full-bridge inverter with resistiveload can be carried-out on similar lines of half-bridge
inverter with resistive-load
Hence all equations of half-bridge are valid with Edc/2
replaced by Edc
Average Output
Voltage:

E0 av

e ( t )d t 0
0

RMS of Output Voltage

E0 RMS

1
2

e02 ( t )d t Edc

4 Edc
Fourier Series : e0 ( t )
sin( n t )
n 1,3,5.. n

Fundamental Output Voltage

2 2 Edc
E 0 ( fund .)

E0 ( fund .)
n Harmonic component E 0 (n )
n
th

Switch (Device) Voltage and Current

Ratings
V E
CE 0

DC

The current waveform for switch is a squarewave with a peak value of Edc/2R.
ITavg

IT RMS

T 2

IT Peak

Edc
R

Edc
Edc
dt
2R
2R

T 2

Edc
Edc
2 R dt
2R

Problem2
A single-phase full-bridge inverter is operated
from a 48V battery and is supplying power to
a pure resistive load of 10 Ohm. Determine:
(i) the fundamental output voltage and the
first five harmonics.
(ii) RMS value by direct integration method
and harmonic summation method.
(ill) Output rms power and output
fundamental power.
(iv) Transistor switch ratings.

Operation with RL Load

Mode-I (t1 < t < t2):
At instant t1, the switch S1 and S2 are turned-on.
Point P gets connected to positive point of d.c. Source Edc through S1
Point Q gets connected to negative point of input supply.
The output voltage, eo = + Edc
The load current starts increasing exponentially due to the inductive nature of the
load.
The instantaneous current through S1 and S2 is equal to the instantaneous load
current.
During this interval, energy is stored in inductive load.
Mode-II (t2 < t < t3):
Both the switches Q1 and Q2 are turned-off at instant t2. Due to the inductive nature
of the load, the load current does not reduce to zero instantaneously
There is a self-induced voltage across the load which maintains the flow of current in
the same-direction.
The polarity of this voltage is exactly opposite to that in mode-I
The output voltage becomes Edc but the load current continues to flow in the same
direction, through D3 and D4
Thus, in this mode, the stored energy in the load inductance is returned back to the
source. Load current decreases exponentially and goes to 0 at instant t3 when all the
energy stored in the load is returned back to supply
D3 and D4 are turned-off at t3

Mode III (t3 < t < t4):

Switches S3 and S4 are turned-on simultaneously at instant t3 Load
voltage remains negative (- Edc) but the direction of load current will
reverse
The current increases exponentially in the other direction and the
load again stores the energy
Mode IV (to < t < t1):
Switches S3 and S4 are turned-off at instant to (or t4)
The load inductance tries to maintain the load current in the same
direction by inducing the positive-load voltage.
This will forward-bias the diodes D1 and D2
The load energy is returned back to the input dc supply. The load
voltage becomes eo = +Edc but the load current remains negative
and decreases exponentially towards zero.
At t1 (or t5), the load current goes to zero and switches S1 and S2
can be turned-on again.
The conduction period with a very highly inductive load, will be T/4
or 90 for all the switches as well as the diodes.
The conduction period of switches will increase towards T/2 or 180
with increase in the load powerfactor

Circuit-Analysis
Average Output
Voltage:
T

E0 av

1
e0 ( t )d t 0
T 0

RMS of Output Voltage

E0 RMS

T 2

T 2

E 2dt Edc

4 Edc
Fourier Series : e0 ( t )
sin( n t )
n 1,3,5.. n

Fundamental component

E1 RMS

2 2 Edc

0.9 E dc

E0 ( fund .)
n Harmonic component E 0 (n )
n
th

For RL load, the equation for the instantaneous

current io
can be found as
4 Edc
i0 ( t )
sin( n t n )
n 1,3,5.. n
R 2 ( n L)2
n L

n tan 1

Z n R 2 ( n L)2

The single phase full-bridge inverter has a

source voltage Edc = 220 V. The inverter

supplies an RLC load with R = 10 ohm, L = 10
mH and C = 52 F. The inverter frequency is
400 Hz. Determine:
(a) the rms load current at fundamental
frequency
(b) the rms value of load current
(c) the power output
(d) the average supply current

PERFORMANCE PARAMETERS OF INVERTERS

Ideally, an inverter should give a sinusoidal
voltage at its output.
However, outputs of practical inverters are non-

sinusoidal and may be resolved into fundamental

and harmonic components.
Performance of an inverter is usually evaluated in

terms of the following performance parameters.

Harmonic Factor of nth Harmonic (HFn)

The harmonic factor is a measure of the
individual harmonic contribution in the output
voltage of an inverter.
It is defined as the ratio of the rms voltage of
a particular harmonic component to the rms
value of fundamental component
EnRMS
HFn
E1 RMS

Total Harmonic Distortion (THD)

A total harmonic distortion is a measure of
closeness in a shape between the output
voltage waveform and its fundamental
component
It is defined as the ratio of the rms value of its
total harmonic component of the output
voltage and the rms value of the fundamental
component Mathematically,
THD

n 2,3,4...

2
E nRMS

E02RMS E12 E1

E1 RMS

Distortion Factor (DF):

A distortion factor indicates the amount of

harmonics that remain in the output voltage

waveform, after the waveform has been subjected
to second-order attenuation (i.e. divided by n 2). It
is defined as
2

EnRMS
DF
E1 RMS

2
n
n 2,3,4...
Lowest-Order Harmonics (LOH) :
The lowest frequency harmonic, with a magnitude
greater than or equal to three-per cent of the
magnitude of the fundamental component of the output
voltage, is known as lowest-order harmonic. Higher the
frequency of the LOR, lower will be the distortion in the

A single-phase half-bridge inverter has a

resistive load of R == 3 Ohm and the de input

voltage Edc = 24 Volts. Determine:
(a) IGBT ratings (b) Total harmonic distortion
THD
(c) The distortion factor DF
(d) The harmonic factor and the distortion
factor of the lowest order harmonic

A single-phase transistorized bridge inverter

has a resistive load of R = 3 Ohm and the dc

input voltage of Edc = 48 Volt. Determine :
(a) Transistor ratings (b) Total harmonic
distortion
(c) Distortion factor DF
(d) Harmonic factor and distortion factor at
the lowest order harmonic

VOLTAGE CONTROL OF SINGLE-PHASE INVERTERS

In many industrial applications, it is often required to
vary the output voltage of the inverter due to the
following reasons:
to compensate for the variations in the input voltage.
to compensate for the regulation of inverters.
to supply some special loads which need variation of
voltage with frequency, such as an induction motor.
The various methods for the control of output voltage of
inverters are as under:
External control of a.c. output voltage.
External control of d.c. input voltage.
Internal control of inverter.
The first two methods require the use of peripheral
components, whereas the third method requires no
peripheral components.

External Control of A.C. Output Voltage

In this type of control, an a.c. voltage controller is inserted
between the output terminals of inverter and the load
terminals
Through the firing angle control of a.c. voltage controller, the
voltage input to the a.c. load is regulated
This method gives rise to higher harmonic content in the
output voltage, particularly when the output voltage from the
a.c. voltage controller is at low level
Therefore, this method is rarely employed except for low
power applications.

External Control of D.C. Input Voltage

When the available voltage source is a.c., then d.c. voltage
input to the inverter is controlled through a fully-controlled
rectifier through an uncontrolled rectifier and a chopper or
through an a.c. voltage controller and an uncontrolled
rectifier .
In case the available voltage source is d.c., then d.c.
voltage input to the inverter is controlled by means of a
chopper
The main advantages of voltage control schemes are:
As the inverter output voltage is controlled through the
adjustment of d.c. input voltage to the inverter, output
voltage waveform and its harmonic contents are not
affected appreciably.
If the d.c. input to the inverter is varied to compensate for
source voltage fluctuations, the inverter can be designed
for a very limited voltage range. Such an inverter is most
efficient, both in terms of power loss and component
utilisation.

This method of voltage control, however, suffers

from the following disadvantages:
Filter circuit increases the cost, weight and size,
and at the same time reduces efficiency and
makes the transient response sluggish.
For reducing the ripple content of d.c. voltage
input to the inverter, a filter circuit is required in all
type of schemes.
In these schemes, the number of power converters
used for the control of inverter output voltage
varies from two to three.
More power handling converter stages results in
more losses and reduced efficiency of the entire
scheme.

The commutating capacitor voltage decreases as

the d.c. input voltage is reduced. This has the

effect of reducing the circuit turn-off time for the
SCR for a constant load current.
Therefore, for a large variation of output voltage

for a constant load current, control of d.c. input

voltage is not desirable.
This limitation can, however, be overcome by a

separated fixed d.c. source for charging the

commutating capacitor, but this makes the
scheme costly and complicated.

Internal Control of Inverter

Inverter output voltage can also be adjusted

by exercising a control within the inverter

itself.
The two possible ways of doing this are:
Series inverter control
Pulse-width modulation control

Series Inverter Control

Series Inverter Control

This method of voltage control involves the use of two or
more inverters in series
The output voltage of two inverters can be summed up with
the help of transformers to obtain an adjustable output
voltage
The inverter output is fed to two transformers whose
secondaries are connected in series
Phasor sum of the two voltages EL1 and EL2 gives the
resultant voltage EL
The voltage EL = [EL1 2+ EL2 2+ 2 EL1 EL2 cos ]1/2
It is essential that the frequency of output voltages EL1 EL2
from the two inverters are the same
When is zero, EL = EL1 + EL2 and for = EL = 0
In case EL1 = EL2 ,The angle can be varied by the firing
angle control of two inverters.
The series connection of inverters, called multiple inverter
control, does not augment the harmonic content even at low
output voltage levels.

Pulse-width Modulation Control

The most efficient method of controlling the output voltage is to incorporate

pulse width modulation control(PWM control) within the inverters

In this method, a fixed d.c. input voltage is supplied to the inverter and a
controlled a.c. output voltage is obtained by adjusting the on-and-off periods
of the inverter devices.
The PWM control has the following advantages:
The output voltage control can be obtained without any additional
components
With this type of control, lower order harmonics can be eliminated or
minimised along with its output voltage control
The filtering requirements are minimised as higher order harmonics can be
filtered easily
The main drawback of this method is that the SCRs used in this method must
have very low turn-on and turn-off times (inverter-grade SCRs), therefore,
they are very expensive.
The commonly used PWM control techniques are:
Single-pulse width modulation (SPWM)
Multiple-pulse width modulation (MPWM)
Sinusoidal pulse width modulation (sin PWM)

Low-pass filters
In square wave inverters, maximum output voltage is
achievable. However there in NO control in harmonics
and output voltage magnitude.
The harmonics are always at three, five, seven etc.
times the fundamental frequency.
Hence the cut-off frequency of the low pass filter is
somewhat fixed.
The filter size is dictated by the VA ratings of the inverter.
To reduce filter size, the PWM switching scheme can be
utilised.
In this technique, the harmonics are pushed to higher
frequencies.
Thus the cut-off frequency of the filter is increased.
Hence the filter components (I.e. L and C) sizes are
reduced.
The trade off for this flexibility is complexity in the

Notchingof square wave

Notching results in controllable output voltage

magnitude

Pulse-width modulation (PWM)

A better square wave notching is shown below - this is
known as PWM technique.
Both amplitude and frequency can be controlled
independently. Very flexible.

T
PWM- output voltage
and
frequency control

Single-pulse Width Modulation

In single-pulse width modulation control, there is only
one pulse per half-cycle and the width of the pulse is
varied to control the inverter output voltage.
By comparing a rectangular reference signal of
amplitude, ER with a triangular carrier wave of
amplitude EC .
The fundamental frequency of output voltage is
determined by the frequency of the reference signal.
The pulse-width, P, can be varied from 0 to 180 by
varying ER from 0 to EC .
The ratio of ER to Ec is the control variable and is
defined as the amplitude modulation index.
The amplitude modulation index, or simply
modulation index is
E
M R
EC

The Fourier series of EL is

EL

n 1,3,5,....

An sin n t

n 1,3,5,....

Bn sin n t

2
2
An Edc sin(nt ) d t
0

2 p

2 p

sin( nt ) d t

4 Edc
np

sin
5
2

2 Edc
Bn

2 p

2 p

cos(nt ) d t 0

4 Edc
np
EL
sin sin n t
2
n 1,3,5,.... n

When pulse-width p is equal to its maximum

value of radians, then the fundamental
component of output voltage EL has the peak
value of
E L1 m

4 Edc

The RMS output voltage can be found from

E LRMS Edc

The peak value of the nth harmonic component is given by

E Lnm

4 Edc
np

sin
n
2

E Lnm

E L1 m

np

sin

Harmonic content in SPWM

Pole Voltage Waveform With A Dc Modulating Signal

The comparator output (Q) and the pole voltage (VAO)

By using simple mathematics the high-duration of

the pulses (th), during which the pole voltage

magnitude is 0.5Edc, can be found to be
where Tc is the time period of the triangular

carrier waveform, Vm is the magnitude of the

modulating signal and Vc(Cap) is the peak (positive)
magnitude of the carrier signal.
The low-duration (tl) of pulses during which the
pole voltage magnitude is -0.5Edc, can be found as:

The dc component of the pole voltage (V0) can be

found to be

Multiple Pulse-width Modulation

In this method of pulse-width modulation, the

harmonic content can be reduced using several

pulses in each half-cycle of output voltage.
By comparing a reference signal with a triangular
carrier wave, the gating signals are generated for
turning on and turning-off of a thyristor.
The carrier frequency, fc, determines the number
of pulses per half-cycle, Np, whereas the frequency
of reference signal sets the output frequency, fo.
The modulation index controls the output voltage.
This type of modulation is also known as
symmetrical pulse width modulation.

Multiple-pulse width modulation

The number of pulses Np per half-cycle is found from

the expression,
mf
fc
NP

2 f0
2
where

fc
mf
f0

is the frequency modulation ratio.

The variation of modulation index (M) from 0 to 1

varies the pulse width from 0 to /Np and the output

voltage from 0 to Edc
If P is the width of each pulse, the RMS output
voltage can be obtained from the following
expression

E L( RMS ) Edc

NP P

Modulation Index
Modulation index is the ratio of peak magnitudes

of the modulating waveform and the carrier

waveform.
It relates the inverters dc-link voltage and the
magnitude of pole voltage (fundamental
component) output by the inverter.
Now let Vm sin(t) be the modulating signal and
let the magnitude of triangular carrier signal vary
between the peak magnitudes of +Vc and -Vc.
The ratio of the peak magnitudes of modulating
wave (Vm) and the carrier wave (Vc) is defined
Vm (m).
as modulation-index
m

Vc

Modulation Index
Normally the magnitude of modulation index is

limited below one (i.e., 0< m <1).

For 0< m <1, the instantaneous magnitude of
fundamental pole voltage (V AO,1) will be given by:
VAO,1 = 0.5 Edc m sin(t)
where is the angular frequency of the

modulating waveform. For m = 1 the pole output

1

E
voltage (fundamental component) will have a
rms
2 2
magnitude of 0.35Edc (
).
dc

This magnitude, as can be found out from is only

78.5% of the fundamental pole voltage magnitude

output by a square wave inverter operating from
the same dc link voltage.

Over-Modulation
When the peak magnitude of modulating signal

exceeds the peak magnitude of carrier signal

(resulting in m > 1), the PWM inverter operates
under over-modulation.
During over-modulation the fundamental
component of the pole voltage increases slightly
with increase in modulation index but the linear
relation between them,), no longer continues.
Also, lower frequency harmonics crop up in the
pole-output waveform. It may easily be seen that
for m very high (say m = infinity), the pole
voltage shape will be identical to the square
wave shape.
Over modulation is generally not preferred
because of the introduction of lower frequency

The general expression for various harmonics

in the output voltage is obtained by deriving an

expression for a general pair of pulses, such
that the Positive pulse of duration P starts at t
= and the negative one of the same width
starts at t = +
The effects of all Pulses can be combined
together to obtain the effective output voltage.
Thus for this pair of pulses,

Anm

2 Edc

m p 2

sin( n t ) d ( t )

m p 2

2 Edc

cos n( m p 2) cos n( m p 2)
n

Bnm

2 Edc

m p 2

cos( n t ) d ( t )

m p 2

2 Edc

sin n( m p 2) sin n( m p 2)
n
If there are k pulses situated at 1, 2, 3 .,

K then
4 Edc
p k
An
sin n sin n m
n
2 m 1

4 Edc
p k
Bn
cos n sin n m
n
2 m 1

Harmonic content of MPWM

For K = 3 and K = 10, amplitude of first, third, fifth

and seventh harmonics as a ratio of the maximum

value of fundamental are plotted against the pulse
width expressed as a ratio of distance between two
adjacent pulses.
As the number of pulses per half-cycle (i.e. k) is
increased, the considerable reduction in lower order
harmonics is achieved.
With K = 10, substantial reduction in third, fifth and
seventh harmonics is achieved in the complete
range of the output voltage.
With larger values of Np, the amplitudes of lower
order harmonics would be lower, but the amplitudes
of some higher order harmonics would increase.
However, such higher order harmonics produce
negligible ripple or can easily be filtered out

With this method, since voltage control is

achieved with a simultaneous reduction of

lower order harmonics, this scheme is
comparatively advantageous over single-pulse
modulation.
However, due to larger number of pulses per
halfcycle,
frequent turning-on and turning-off of
thyristors is required which increases the
switching losses.
Also, for this scheme inverter-grade thyristors
are required which are costly.

Sinusoidal Pulse Width Modulation

In this method of modulation, several pulses per half-cycle are

used as in the case of multiple pulse width modulation

Instead of maintaining the width of all pulses the same as in the
case of multiple-pulse modulation, the width of each pulse is
varied proportional to the amplitude of a sine-wave evaluated at
the centre of the same pulse
By comparing a sinusoidal reference signal with a triangular
carrier wave of frequency, fc, the gating signals are generated
The frequency of reference signal, f r , determine the inverter
output frequency and its peak amplitude, controls the
modulation index, M, and then in turn the RMS output voltage, E L
The number of pulses per halfcycle depends on the carrier
frequency
Within the constraint that two thyristors of the same arm (T1, T4)
cannot conduct at the same time, the instantaneous output
voltage is shown in following figure
The same gating signals can be generated using unidirectional
triangular carrier-wave

Sinusoidal pulse-width modulation

Sinusoidal pulse-width modulation

By varying the modulation index M, the RMS

output voltage can be varied.

It can be observed that the area of each pulse
corresponds approximately to the area under
the sine-wave between the adjacent
midpoints of OFF periods on the gating
signals.
If Pm is the width of the mth pulse, the rms
output voltage.
1/ 2
Np

Pm
E L Edc
m 1

Harmonic analysis of the output modulated voltage wave

reveals that SPWM has the following important features:
For modulation index less than one, the largest harmonic

amplitudes in the output voltage are associated with

harmonics of order fc /fr. 1 or 2Np 1, where Np is the
number of pulses per half-cycle
By increasing the number of pulses per half-cycle, the
order of dominant harmonic frequency can be raised, which
can then be filtered out easily.
For Np = 5, harmonics of the order of 9 and 11 become
significant in the output voltage. It may be noted that the
highest order of significant harmonic of modulated voltagewave is centred around the carrier frequency
For modulation index greater than one, lower order
harmonics appear since for modulation index greater than
one, pulse width is no longer a sinusoidal function of the
angular position of the pulse.

PULSE-WIDTH MODULATED(PWM) INVERTERS

Square-wave inverters suffers from two major
drawbacks:
The output voltage of the inverter cannot be controlled
for a fixed-source voltage.
To achieve voltage control, the inverter must be fed
either from a controlled ac-dc or from a dc-dc
converter.
The output voltage contains appreciable harmonics
(low-frequency range). Also, THD is very high.
Due to these drawbacks, square-wave inverter is
rarely used in practice.
To achieve voltage control within the inverter and to
reduce the harmonic contents in the output voltage,
PWM inverters are used.
In PWM inverters, width of the output pulses are
modulated to achieve the voltage control.

PWM technique allows:

Variation of output voltage within the inverter by
varying the gain of the inverter. This allows the
input d.c. voltage to be of fixed amplitude
Variation of output frequency either by varying
the number of pulses per half cycle of the output
or by varying the period for each half-cycle with
fixed number of pulses in each half-cycle
Simultaneous variation of output voltage and
frequency is also possible - So that V/f ratio can
be kept constant. This feature is required in
induction motor-drives.
Control of harmonics at the output of the inverter.

Pulse-Width Modulated Half-Bridge Inverters

With a half-bridge inverter, an output voltage of zero is not

possible-the output Voltage can be only positive or negative.

Therefore, the output voltage is allowed to reverse instead of
being zero.
We can control the output Voltage by controlling the width 2.
Sinusoidal PWM - a rectified sinusoidal reference signal is
compared with a triangular carrier-wave.
For the time during which the reference signal is higher than
the carrier-wave, the switches are operated to produce
positive-going pulses; otherwise, negative-going pulses are
produced.

ER > EC , S1 is ON and e0 = +Edc.

ER < EC , S2 is ON and e0 = -Edc

carrier frequency ratio

Mf

f
Frequency of the carrier signal
c 1
Frequency of the modulating signal f m

Circuit Analysis:
Fundamental Output Voltage
The fundamental output voltage can be very
easily found by assuming that the carrier ratio is
quite high
Fundamental output voltage is proportional to the
instantaneous modulation index and to the peakvalue of the output voltage (Edc/2)

Edc
Eo ( fund ) M
sin m t ;
2
Em
Where M
Ec

M 1

Maximum value of fundamental output

voltage occurs at M = 1,
Edc
Edc
E0( fund )
0.707
2
2 2
Inverter Gain

Fundamental output voltage 0.707 M Edc 2

Gain

DC input voltage
E dc 2
Gain

EG 0.707 M

EG (max) 0.707, when M 1

RMS Output Voltage

RMS output voltage is given by
EoRMS

Edc

EoRMS E

2
o ( fund )

2
o ( 2)

2
o (3)

...... E

2
o ( fund )

E0(2 n )
n 2

2
2
2
E

E
0( n )
o ( rms )
o ( fund ) E n
n 2

En sum of all the harmonics except fundamental .

Edc
En
2

2 M2
2

Distortion and Harmonic Factor

Distortion Factor

DF

Eo ( fund )
Eo ( RMS )

0.707 M

DF (max) 0.707, when M 1

1
Harmonic Factor HF
1
2
DF
HFmax 100%, when M 1

2
1
2
M

Harmonics at the Output

The carrier ratio as defined earlier is given by
M F fc fm 2 p

where p is the number of pulses per half-cycle

The harmonic frequencies present at the

output can be expressed as

f n k1 f c k2 f m

where fn = frequency of the nth harmonic

fn
fc
k1
k2
fm
fm

The order of the harmonic 'n' can be written

as
fn
n
k1M F k2
fm

The carrier ratio is usually chosen as odd

number
The waveform then will have a quarter-wave
symmetry and only odd harmonics are
present. This is one of the requirements of a
PWM signal
Now only odd harmonics are present hence if
k, is odd then k2 is even and vice versa
n M f , M f 2 , M f 4 , M f 6 ,........
Therefore, the harmonic present at the output
n 2M f 1 , 2M f 3 , 2 M f 5 , 2 M f 7 ,........
are

n 3M f ,3M f 2 ,3M f 4 ,3M f 6 ,........

Frequency-spectrum for- bipolar sinusoidal

PWM-output in half-bridge-inverter

PWM Full-Bridge Inverters

In a PWM inverter, the output voltage waveform has a

constant amplitude whose polarity reverses periodically

to provide the output fundamental frequency
The source voltage is switched at regular intervals to
produce a variable output voltage
The output voltage of the inverter is controlled by varying
the pulse-width of each cycle of the output voltage
The bridge inverter can be considered to be a
combination of two half bridge circuits
The first half-bridge consists of two switches S1 and S4
whereas the second-one consists of the switches S2 and
S3
The load voltage EPQ is the difference between the output
voltage EPO and EQO of the individual half-bridge circuits

Full-bridge inverter

PWM with Bipolar Voltage Switching

The PWM bipolar switching scheme used with halfbridge inverter can be used more efficiently with the
full-bridge inverter
A triangular wave of peak-amplitude' Ec' is compared
with a sine-wave of peak amplitude Em' to generate
the base-drives for the two devices in the half-bridge
circuit (S1 and S4) Base-drives for S2and S3are exactly
180 out of phase to those of S4 and S1 respectively
Thus, S1 and S2 conduct simultaneously to make the
instantaneous load voltage + Edc and S3 S4 then
conduct simultaneously to make the instantaneous
load voltage, -Edc
The load voltage waveform is a bipolar PWM waveform
with a peak voltage of Edc volts

PWM with Bipolar-voltage switching

-EQO

Circuit Analysis
If the load voltage waveform for half-bridge and full-bridge
PWM inverters are compared, then it will be observed that
they are identical except for the fact that peak-voltage for
full-bridge inverter is +Edc volts instead of (Edc/2)
Therefore, the analysis will proceed on the same lines as
that for the half-bridge inverter to yield the following
results.
RMS value of output

EO (rms)= Edc

RMS value of the fundamental

EO (fund) = 0.707 MEdc

Distortion Factor,

DF = 0.707 . M

Harmonic-factor, HF = (2/M2 - 1)1/2

Gain of inverter, G = 0.707 M
Dominant harmonics: Dominant harmonics for

Mf = odd are again similar to half-bridge

inverter and are

n M f , M f 2 , M f 4 , M f 6 ,........
n 2 M f 1 , 2 M f 3 , 2 M f 5 , 2 M f 7 ,........
n 3M f ,3M f 2 ,3M f 4 ,3M f 6 ,........

PWM with Unipolar PWM Switching

In unipolar PWM switching, the polarity of the
PWM output voltage remains positive or
negative
For positive half-cycle the output voltage
polarity is either (+Edc) or zero
For negative half-cycle, the output polarity is
either (-Edc) or zero
This is called as three-level PWM, since
output takes three voltage levels, +Edc, 0, Edc

Waveforms for unipolar PWM bridge inverter

Unipolar PWM waveform is generated as follows:

In full-bridge unipolar PWM-inverter, the two half-bridges are
given two separate control signals.
Bipolar triangular wave of peak -amplitude is compared with
two sinusoidal modulating signals which are 180 out of
phase.
The base-driving waveforms for the switches S1 and S4,
which forms the first-half-bridge inverter are generated by
comparing the triangular waveform with the first sinusoidal
modulating signal
Due to this, a bipolar PWM waveform is generated at the
output of the first half-bridge (VPO).
The base-driving signals for switches S2 and S3 which forms
the second half-bridge inverter are generated by comparing
the triangular waveform with second modulating signal (out
of phase modulating signal)
Due to this a bipolar PWM signal is generated at the output
of second half-bridge inverter (EQO ).

The output voltage of the bridge inverter =

EPO EQO = EPQ

The output voltage is generated by using the
following logic:
If switches S1 and S2 are ON, EPQ = + Edc
If switch S3 and S4 are ON, EPQ = - Edc
If S1 and S3 are ON, EPQ = 0
If S4 and S2 are ON, EPQ = 0

Harmonic Spectrum and Fundamental Output In

unipolar PWM
Due to the 180 phase-shift between two
reference signals, the carrier frequency at the
output is effectively doubled
The most significant harmonic is twice that of
bipolar PWM
The most significant harmonics selecting M f as
even are given by

n 2M f 1 , 4M f 1 , 6M f 1
E0 fund 0.707 M Edc ,

for 0 M 1

Output of the inverter is chopped AC voltage with zero

DC component.
In some applications such as UPS, high purity sine
wave output is required.
An LC section low-pass filter is normally fitted at the
inverter output to reduce the high frequency harmonics.
In some applications such as AC motor drive, filtering is
not required.

Output voltage harmonics

Why need to consider harmonics?
Waveform quality must match TNB supply.
Power Quality issue.
In some applications, harmonics cause
degradation of equipment. Equipment need to
be de-rated.
Total Harmonic Distortion (THD):

where n s the harmonics number.

Current THD can be obtained by replacing the

harmonic voltage with harmonic current :

Zn is the impedance at harmonic frequency.