High Frequency Wide Output Range Boost-Flyback

Converter with Zero Voltage Switching

Yuan Liu1 , Yi Dou2 , Mingxing Du1 , Kexin Wei1 , Hurley Gerard1 , Michael A.E.Andersen2 and Ziwei Ouyang2
1
School of Electrical and Engineering,Tianjin University of Technology,Tian jin, China
2
Electrical Engineering,Technical University of Denmark, Copenhagen, Denmark
zo@elektro.dtu.dk

Abstract—DC-DC converters with high step-up capability are adjustment capability [11], [12]. In order to further shrink
increasingly used in sustainable energy, aerospace and high the size of the converter, higher switching frequencies can be
voltage direct current (HVDC) systems. This paper presents a considered to decrease the size of the passive components es-
high voltage step-up dc-dc converter with low voltage stress on
the switches and with a wide output range. High-frequency op- pecially the inductors. In this paper a Zero Voltgae Switching
eration with zero voltage switching (ZVS) may be accomplished, (ZVS) boost-flyback converter with high-frequency operation
in order to shrink the size and to increase the efficiency of the for solar battery applications is proposed. The operation of
converter. ZVS turn-on is possible in all the switches by the the ZVS turn-on transient is introduced and we will show
same principle as an active clamp structure. The detailed ZVS that ZVS turn-on can be realized both with Continuous Con-
condition and design considerations are discussed in the paper.
A 100W 28V to maximum 400V prototype is designed and its duction Mode(CCM) and Discontinuous Conduction Mode
peak efficiency of 95% has been achieved. (DCM). The experimental prototype will show that the ZVS
Keywords—boost-flyback converter, ZVS turn-on, high gain can be realized and the peak efficiency can reach 95% with
converter, high frequency converter, wide output range 100 W output.

II. PRINCIPLE OPERATION

I. I NTRODUCTION The active-clamp structure is widely used in flyback con-
Nowadays, rapid developments are taking place for sus- verters to achieve ZVS turn-on and to reduce switching losses
tainable energy including fuel cells and photovoltaics, in on the low-side switches. In boost-flyback converters an
order to protect the environment and save energy. Thus, the intrinsic active-clamp consisting of a switch and a capacitor
need for high efficiency, high power density, high voltage can be used to achieve soft-switching for both high-side and
step-up dc-dc converters are needed to feed power to the low-side switches.
grid[1], [2], [3], [4]. Besides, high voltage step-up dc-dc The topology of the proposed ZVS boost-flyback converter
converters are also widely used in aerospace industries and is illustrated in Fig. 1 and the key waveforms in DCM
for high voltage direct current (HVDC) power transmission are illustrated in Fig. 3. Fig. 2 shows eight operational
systems [5], [6]. The conventional boost converter can be subintervals which may be described as follows:
used while the duty cycle needs to be extremely high to ach Mode 1[Fig. 2(a), t0 < t < t1 ] At t0 , main switch
sufficiently high voltage gain, where it would result in large S1 is turned on, and boost switchS2 and D are off. The
power loss and less controlability [2], [7]. Several topologies magnetizing inductance Lm and the leakage inductance Ll
utilize high turns ratio in coupling inductors; transformers or are charged by the input voltage. During this period, the
switch-cap hybrid structures to achieve high boost capability output capacitors Cf and Cb are discharged to support the
[8], [9], [10]. output voltage.
The boost-flyback converter is one of the best solutions for Mode 2[Fig. 2(b), t1 < t < t2 ]At t1 , the main switch
S1 is turned off, the parasitic output capacitor of switch
V
S1 is charged from 0V to Vin + nf ≈Vb + VCoss2 . Where
Vin is input voltage, Vf is output voltage of flyback part,
Vb is the output voltage of boost part, VCoss2 is voltage of
parasitic output capacitor with siwtch S2 . The resonant circuit
is composed of Coss1 . Ll and Lm . The magnetixing current
is given as equation (1) and the current can be estimated by
equation (2)
Vin
iLm = iLm (t1 )cos(ω1 (t − t1 )) + sin(ω1 (t − t1 )) (1)
Z1
Vin − V1
Fig. 1: Boost-flyback converter topology iLm (t) = iLm (t1 ) + (t − t1 ) (2)
Lm

high step-up applications with the benefits of low voltage 1 Lm + Ll
ω1 =  , Z1 = (3)
stress on the switches; high step-up capability and voltage Coss1 (Lm + Ll ) Coss1

978-1-5386-6054-6/18/$31.00 2018
c IEEE
 2

Fig. 2: Operating Modes of Proposed Converter

In this period, the voltage of the parasitic output capaci- other hand, the large ripple current induces high conduction
tance VCoss1 is less than Vin + nVf so that no current flows loss in the switch S1 and in the windings.
through the boost switch S2 , therefore ib (t) = 0.
Mode3[Fig. 2(c), t2 < t < t3 ]At t2 , the body diode of the
A. Voltage gain
switch S2 is turned on and the secondary diode D is turned
on. The leakage inductance Ll and the boost capacitance According to the capacitor Cf and capacitor Cb are enough
Cb begin to resonate. The energy stored in the magnetizing large, the voltage of capacitor Cf and capacitor Cb are
inductance is transferred to the output load. The magnetizing constant. The leakage inductance, winding resistance and
currents is decreased by the slope of −nVf /Lm . In order to transient characteristics of the MOSFET and DIODE are
ensure ZVS and prevent the conduction loss resulting from neglected.
the body diode of main switch S2 , this period is very short Thus, equation is given as follows:
and is completed by the turn on the boost switch S2 . Vin
Mode 4[Fig. 2(d), t3 < t < t4 ] The system operation is V Cb = (4)
1−D
similar to Mode 3 expect that the boost current flows through
the boost switch S2 instead of through its body diode. This nDVin
V Cf = (5)
period is ended when the boost current returns to zero. 1−D
Mode 5[Fig.2(e), t4 < t < t5 ]The operation is again similar where n is the turns ratio of the couple inductor. According
to Mode 4 except that the boost current is reversed. The the above equations, the ideal voltage gain of the boost-
period is ends when switch S2 turns off. flyback converter is given as equation (6).
Mode 6[Fig. 2(f), t5 < t < t6 ] At t5 , switch S2 , turns off.
The output capacitor of switch S1 is discharged by the current Vo 1 + nD
= (6)
through the leakage inductance. In this period, the secondary Vin 1−D
diode D remains on and Vpri = −Vf /n. This mode ends
with diode D being turned off. B. Magnetizing inductance
Mode 7[Fig. 2(g), t6 < t < t7 ] At t6 , the secondary diode
D is turned off. The leakage inductance current is equal to The magnetizing inductance is designed for an output
the magnetizing inductance current. This mode finishes when voltage of 200V in DCM over full range. According to the
the voltage of parasitic output capacitor Coss1 reaches 0V. equation:
Im
Mode 8[Fig. 2(h), t7 < t < t0 ]At t7 , the body diode of Iaverage = (7)
switch S1 is turned on. This mode is ended when the switch D
S1 is turned on. where Iaverage is the average value of the magnetizing
current, Im is the input current. D is the duty cycle of main
III. MAGNETIC DESIGN CONSIDERATION switch S1 . According to the equation (6) and equation (7),
D200V < D400V , we design the inductance with the equation:
In the ZVS boost-flyback converter, the transformer loss is
Vin × DT
the main limitation for achieving high efficiency. Determining Lm = (8)
the relevant parameters of the transformer is an important Δi
step. On the one hand, the magnetizing inductance is de- where Lm is the magnetizing inductance. Δi is the magne-
signed to be small enough to draw a reverse current, on the tizing current ripple equal to Iaverage−200V . T is the period.
 3

Fig. 3: Key waveform of proposed converter

C. Turns ratio design

For high frequency converters, planar transformers are
suitable due to their excellent thermal characteristics. With
ZVS, transformer losses are the main limitation for achieving
high efficiency. Transformer losses consist of winding loss
and core loss. The winding loss depends on the primary and
secondary turns. Fig.4 presents different turns ratios in the
desired duty cycle range. In this case, turns ratio n is from
2.5 to 5. Considering the dead time and the boost switch
turn-on time. the main duty cycle is choosing the 0.7, and
turns ratio is 1:4 to meet the specifications.

D. Winding consideration Fig. 4: turns ratio design

Considering the high DC current offset of the boost-
flyback, winding reduce the DC resistance. Litz line and
copper foil is better than PCB. Because of the core loss,
secondary turns is chosen 12. For reducing the proximity Primary winding used 4 litz line with 0.1 × 60 in parallel.
effect with low layer, the litz line is instead of copper foil. Secondary winding used 2 litz line with 0.1 × 20 in parallel.
 4

component Model specification

IV. COMPARED WITH FLYBACK switch BSC160N10N
A. voltage stress diode C3D1P7060Q

High voltage stress of components is a main limitation of TABLE II: component

active flyback. For boost-flyback, the main switch voltage
stress is flowing the equation (9)
Vin Vf 4) winding loss
VS1 = = Vin + (9) As above mentioned, winding loss is calculated by two
1−D n
parts. the DC loss and the AC loss. DC winding loss is
For same output voltage, the output voltage of boost-flyback calculated by the equation (13)
circuit flyback part is lower than the output voltage of active
l
flyback . As the same principle, the voltage of diode D and PwindDC = I × RDC ; RDC = ρ (13)
main switch S1 in the boost-flyback is lower than active S
flyback. Table I is shown the equation of all components Where PwindDC is the DC part of the winding loss, I is the
in the boost-flyback. Where Vo = Vf + Vb . Thus, the voltage offset current of the winding, RDC is the DC resistance of
stress of boost-flyback is lower than active flyback. winding.ρ is the resistivity of copper, used as 1.7 × 10−8 ,l
is the length of the winding, S is the cross-sectional area of
component voltage stress
boost-flyback active flyback
the winding. AC winding loss is flowing the equation (14)
Vf Vo
S1 Vin + n
Vin + n PwindAC = Iac × RAC (14)
Vin Vin
S2 1−D 1−D
D nVin + Vf nVin + Vo Where PwindAC is the AC part of the winding loss, Iac is
the AC current of the winding, RAC is calculated in ANSYS
TABLE I: Voltage stress of components simulation or measured on impedance analyzer.
5) core loss
Considering the core loss is calculated by Pcore =
B. power loss Pv Ve .Where Ve is the volume of the core Pv is calculated
Power loss on the propose circuit consists of power loss on by equation:
components and transformer.For MOSFET S1 and S2 , power Pv = Kf α ΔB β (15)
loss is composed of switching loss and conduction loss.
1) switching loss of MOSFET These three parameter K, α and β are given in datasheet of
Due to active flyback and the boost-flyback are achieving magnetic material. According the thermal situation of core,
the ZVS, switching loss only consists of the turn-off loss. ΔB is chosen 50mT with ML91S. According to Faradary’s
The turn-off loss is following the equation 10: law.
Vf (1 − D)T
Ns = (16)
1 ΔBAe
Pof f = Ipeak Vds tof f fs (10)
2 Where Ns is secondary turns.Vf is secondary turns.Vf is the
Where Pof f is turn off loss of switch,Ipeak is the peak current output voltage of flyback part. Ae is the across-sectional area
through the switch when the switch turn off, Vds is the drain- of core.
source voltage of the switch, tof f is the turn off transition
time, and fs is the frequency. For the reason that the voltage V. EXPERIMENT RESULTS
stress of S1 in the boost-flyback is lower than in the active
To evaluate high step-up operation of the proposed DC-
flyback, the turn-off loss of S1 in the boost-flyback is lower
DC converter can work with ZVS which validate to improve
than in the active flyback, too.
efficiency in the high frequency situation, a 100 W 1MHz
2) conduction loss of MOSFET
prototype of the DC-DC converter is developed and tested in
The conduction loss of switch is calculated by the equation
the laboratory.
11:
2
Pcon = Irms × Rds(on) (11)
Component Parameters
Where Pcon is the conduction power loss, Irms is the rated output power(Po ut) 100W
RMS current of the transistor and Rds(on) is the conduction input voltage(Vin ) 28V
resistance of the MOSFET. Because the voltage stress of the output voltage(Vo ut) 200V-400V
turns ratio 3:12
boost-flyback is lower than active flyback of main switch, we switching frequency 1MHz
can choose the lower conduction resistance MOSFET in the magnetizing inductance 950nH
propose circuit. leakage inductance 91nH
output capacitor boost part 11uF
3) diode loss
output capacitor flyback part 6.6uF
The diode loss can be calculated by the equation (12)
TABLE III: Proposed Boost-flyback converter parameters
PD = I F × V F (12)
Where PD is the diode loss, IF is the RMS current through Table III shows the component parameters of proposed
the diode while VF is the forward voltage of the diode. circuit. The 1MHz 100W 28V/200V-400V boost-flyback con-
According to the loss calculation and voltage stress, Table verter prototype with the proposed topology is shown in
II is shown all the component of the circuit. Fig.5. The control signal is generated by DG4062 function
 5

Fig. 5: Proposed Converter Fig. 7: Efficiency of whole output voltage range

VI. C ONCLUSION
In this paper, the operating principles, theoretical analysis,
design methodology of a high efficiency step-up converter
and experiment are presented. The boost-flyback achieve
ZVS in wide output voltage range help to reduce the switch
loss of main switch. The main switch voltage stress is reduced
by make the flyback output capacitor and boost output
capacitor in series. The experimental results have verified
the predictions of the theoretical analysis. The features of
this converter include high efficiency, high voltage gain and
low voltage stress on the switching element.
a. 200V output voltage
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors would like to thank to YiDou and Dehua
Zhao’s help in the experiment station. Thank Ouyang for
patient guidance.

R EFERENCES
[1] K. C. Tseng, J. T. Lin and C. C. Huang "High Step-Up Converter
with Three-Winding Coupled Inductor for Fuel Cell Energy Source
Applications"" in IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics, vol. 30,
no. 2, pp. 574-581, Feb. 2015.
[2] S. Sathyan, H. M. Suryawanshi, M. S. Ballal and A. B. Shitole, "Soft-
Switching DC–DC Converter for Distributed Energy Sources with
High Step-Up Voltage Capability," in IEEE Transactions on Industrial
Electronics, vol. 62, no. 11, pp. 7039-7050, Nov. 2015.
[3] M. Forouzesh, Y. Shen, K. Yari, Y. P. Siwakoti and F. Blaabjerg, "High-
b. 400V output voltage Efficiency High Step-Up DC-DC Converter with Dual Coupled Induc-
tors for Grid-Connected Photovoltaic Systems," in IEEE Transactions
Fig. 6: Experiment waveform for S1 on Power Electronics, vol. 33, no. 7, pp. 5967-5982, July 2018.
[4] Y. P. Siwakoti and F. Blaabjerg, "Single Switch Nonisolated Ultra-Step-
(Vds1 :20V/div Vgs1 : 5V/div Times:200ns/div) Up DC-DC Converter with an Integrated Coupled Inductor for High
Boost Applications," in IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics, vol.
32, no. 11, pp. 8544-8558, Nov. 2017.
[5] B. Zhao, Z. Ouyang, M. A. E. Anderson, M. Duffy and W. G. Hurley,
"An improved partially interleaved transformer structure for high-
generation from RIGOL. The experimental waveform under voltage high-frequency multiple-output applications," IECON 2017 -
43rd Annual Conference of the IEEE Industrial Electronics Society,
full-load in output voltage 200V condition and output voltage Beijing, 2017, pp. 798-804.
400V condition are presented in Fig.6(a) and Fig.6(b). [6] S. Cui, N. Soltau and R. W. De Doncker, "A High Step-Up Ratio
Soft-Switching DC-DC Converter for Interconnection of MVDC and
Here, it shows that ZVS for both the main switch with HVDC Grids," in IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics, vol. 33,
output voltage from 200V to 400V can be achieved. There is a no. 4, pp. 2986-3001, April 2018.
time delay between the boost switch turn-off and main switch [7] S. K. Changchien, T. J. Liang, J. F. Chen and L. S. Yang, "Novel High
Step-Up DC-DC Converter for Fuel Cell Energy Conversion System,"
turn-on to ensure main switch turn-on at ZVS. According in IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics, vol. 57, no. 6, pp. 2007-
to the peak current through the boost switch when turn on 2017, June 2010.
the boost switch is large, there is also a short time delay [8] G. Wu, X. Ruan and Z. Ye, "High Step-Up DC-DC Converter Based
on Switched Capacitor and Coupled Inductor," in IEEE Transactions
between the main switch turn-off and boost switch turn-on on Industrial Electronics, vol. 65, no. 7, pp. 5572-5579, July 2018.
to ensure boost switch turn-on at ZVS. Fig.7 is shown the [9] A. Ajami, H. Ardi and A. Farakhor, "A Novel High Step-up DC-
circuit efficiency with different output voltage from 200V to DC Converter Based on Integrating Coupled Inductor and Switched-
Capacitor Techniques for Renewable Energy Applications," in IEEE
400V. The measured efficiency of the prototype is 95.3% at Transactions on Power Electronics, vol. 30, no. 8, pp. 4255-4263, Aug.
output voltage 200V. 2015.
 6

[10] G. Wu, X. Ruan and Z. Ye, "Nonisolated High Step-Up DC-DC

Converters Adopting Switched-Capacitor Cell," in IEEE Transactions
on Industrial Electronics, vol. 62, no. 1, pp. 383-393, Jan. 2015.
[11] X. Ding, D. Yu, Y. Song and B. Xue, "Integrated switched coupled-
inductor boost-flyback converter," 2017 IEEE Energy Conversion
Congress and Exposition (ECCE), Cincinnati, OH, 2017, pp. 211-216.
[12] S. W. Lee and H. L. Do, "A Single-Switch AC-DC LED Driver Based
on a Boost-Flyback PFC Converter with Lossless Snubber," in IEEE
Transactions on Power Electronics, vol. 32, no. 2, pp. 1375-1384, Feb.
2017.
[13] Bor-Ren Lin, Huann-Keng Chiang, Kao-Cheng Chen and David Wang,
"Analysis, design and implementation of an active clamp flyback
converter," 2005 International Conference on Power Electronics and
Drives Systems, Malaysia, 2005, pp. 424-429