Core loss measurement and comparative analysis for soft magnetic materials under complex non-sinusoidal excitations

With the advancement of wide-bandgap power devices, the power electronics equipment is developing toward higher switching frequencies and more complex switching modes in recent years. Accurate prediction of the core loss for magnetic components has been emphasized as the excitations of magnetic materials varying depending on the operating mode of the power supplies. Therefore, this paper presents the results of an extensive core loss study performed on nanocrystalline alloy (FT-3KL), amorphous alloy (1K101) and ultra-thin oriented silicon steel (GT-50). Firstly, an automatic setup for core loss measurement of soft magnetic materials fed by a full-bridge inverter based on silicon carbide (SiC) MOSFET is proposed. Then, the effects of switching oscillations from the inverter and the characteristic parameters of complex non-sinusoidal excitations on the core loss are analyzed comparatively. The core loss shows different regular distributions with the change of each characteristic parameter of excitations respectively. However, the regular distributions will be influenced by the high-frequency switching oscillations, which makes the prediction of core loss more complicated. This paper can provide a reference for the development of high-precision core loss model and performance optimization of power electronics equipment.