3306 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 65, NO.

4, APRIL 2018

Dual-Transformer-Based DAB Converter With

Wide ZVS Range for Wide Voltage Conversion
Gain Application
Guo Xu , Student Member, IEEE, Deshang Sha , Senior Member, IEEE, Yaxiong Xu ,
and Xiaozhong Liao, Member, IEEE

Abstract—A control strategy is proposed for the dual- distribution system [3]. The dual-active-bridge (DAB) dc–dc
transformer-based dual-active-bridge converter to achieve converter, first proposed in [4], has been an attractive alter-
wide zero-voltage switching (ZVS) range for wide voltage native to these applications owing to its advantages such as
conversion gain range application. The phase-shift control
is adopted for the dual-transformer-based converter with zero-voltage switching (ZVS), high power density, bidirectional
minimum power switches employing half bridge output, and power control, galvanic isolation, and a symmetric structure.
a control law is proposed to achieve wide ZVS range and The DAB dc–dc converter generally consists of two active
reduce the current-related loss. With the proposed method, bridges and one transformer with a relatively large leakage in-
four switches of the converter can achieve full range of ZVS.
ductance. The phases of two high-frequency voltages generated
The other two switches can achieve full-range ZVS under
positive power flow, while a slightly reduced ZVS region un- by the two bridges are shifted to control the delivered power.
der reverse power flow. Unlike the methods employing three Many research studies can be found on modulation strategies
control degrees of freedom, the proposed method only uti- for these DAB converters [5]. Single-phase-shift control [6],
lizes two decoupled control variables, making the controller [7] is very simple. The two high-frequency voltages generated
easy to be implemented, more reliable, and independent of by the two active bridges are both square waves with a fixed
the converter parameters. In addition, the design of turns ra-
tios for the two transformers is also optimized based on the duty ratio 0.5, and the power transfer is controlled only by the
control law and loss analysis. The effectiveness of the con- phase-shift ratio between the two voltages. This method can
verter with the proposed control is verified by experimental achieve full-range ZVS, low peak current, and low circulating
results from a 1-kW prototype. current under the optimal operating point when the input volt-
Index Terms—Dual-active-bridge (DAB) converter, dual- age V1 equals N V2 , where V2 is the output voltage and N is
transformer-based, wide conversion gain, wide zero-voltage the transformer turns ratio. However, under nonoptimal operat-
switching (ZVS) range. ing conditions when V1 varies from N V2 , the converter suffers
from high peak current, large root-mean-square (RMS) current,
I. INTRODUCTION and reduced ZVS range. To achieve better performance under
the nonoptimal operating gain, the extended phase shift (EPS)
IDIRECTIONAL dc–dc converters are important power
B interfaces for many power applications, such as an en-
ergy storage system [1], an electric vehicle charger [2], and a
can be adopted [8]. Instead of fixing the two duty ratios of the
bridges to be 0.5, it utilizes one duty ratio as an extra control
degree of freedom to obtain reduced loss and wider ZVS range.
Furthermore, to optimize the converter performance, both duty
Manuscript received April 19, 2017; revised July 29, 2017; accepted ratios can be utilized in the control such as dual-phase-shift con-
August 30, 2017. Date of publication September 29, 2017; date of current
version January 5, 2018. This work was supported in part by the National trol [9] and triple-phase-shift (TPS) control [10]. The challenge
Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant 51577012, in part for these methods is how to find the optimal combinations of the
by the Program for New Century Excellent Talents in the University of three independent control variables, which include the phase-
China under Grant NCET-13-0043, in part by the State Key Laboratory
of Alternate Electrical Power System with Renewable Energy Sources shift ratio and two duty ratios. As a result, the control laws
under Grant LATS17019, in part by the Key Laboratory of Solar Thermal aimed for different optimization goals [11] have been studied,
Energy and Photovoltaic System of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, such as minimum nonactive current [12], minimum conduc-
in part by the Technology Foundation for Selected Overseas Chinese
Scholar (2014), in part by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social tion loss [13], minimum reactive power [14], full range of ZVS
Security of China, and in part by the 2016 Fundamental Research Fund [15], etc. However, all these methods are based on the complex
of Beijing Institute of Technology. (Corresponding author: Deshang Sha.) power calculation and various working mode classifications and
The authors are with the Advanced Power Conversion Center, School
of Automation, Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing 100081, China are highly dependent on system parameters.
(e-mail: xuguobit@bit.edu.cn; shadeshang@bit.edu.cn; xuyaxiong@bit. To achieve wide ZVS range and simplify the calculation com-
edu.cn; liaoxiaozhong@bit.edu.cn). plexity of TPS control, the boundary trapezoidal modulation
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available
online at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org. control [16] utilizing the magnetizing current can be used, and a
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TIE.2017.2756601 universal model [17] based on the fundamental-optimal strategy

0278-0046 © 2017 IEEE. Personal use is permitted, but republication/redistribution requires IEEE permission.
See http://www.ieee.org/publications standards/publications/rights/index.html for more information.
XU et al.: DUAL-TRANSFORMER-BASED DAB CONVERTER WITH WIDE ZVS RANGE FOR WIDE VOLTAGE CONVERSION GAIN APPLICATION 3307

is also effective. However, their effectiveness is not studied for

wide voltage gain range applications, which is important for the
photovoltaic systems or energy storage. In these applications,
the battery voltage may vary a lot at different charging statuses,
such as from 250 to 450 V. For the dc–dc converter used for the
electric vehicle charger and energy storage systems, the power
level can be as low as several kilowatts and as high as hundreds
of kilowatts, and ZVS is essential for these converters.
The fundamental duty modulation in [18] based on [17] is Fig. 1. Topology of the dual-transformer-based DAB converter.
proposed for wide voltage gain range applications. Although
the calculation complexity is reduced, ZVS range is still limited
under the nonoptimal operating gain condition. For a conven-
tional DAB topology with wide voltage gain range, the conflict
occurs between the simplified control and wide ZVS range.
Consequently, in [19], a converter based on the modification
of the conventional DAB topology is proposed to achieve wide
ZVS range under wide input voltage gain. However, a hybrid
control needs to be adopted, which is also complex and highly
dependent on system parameters.
The concept of a dual-transformer-based converter is used in
[20] to achieve full ZVS range and reduced filter size for the
conventional full bridge with pulse-width modulation (PWM)
control. Also, a dual-transformer-based full-bridge converter
with discontinuous-conduction mode operation [21] is studied
to minimize the switching number, reduce the filter size, and
improve the efficiency. In [22], the dual-transformer-based con-
cept is extended to converters with phase-shift control to achieve
wide voltage gain range, while the power flow is unidirectional Fig. 2. Typical waveforms for the dual-transformer-based DAB con-
with the use of a diode rectifier. Besides, ZVS range of the verter when 0 < Φ < D 1 .
converter in [22] is also limited. Wide ZVS range and wide con-
version gain can be both achieved for a dual-transformer-based
converter in [23]. However, the converter has many power de- reduce the total switching numbers and eliminate one control
vices, and the power is also unidirectional. variable. Meanwhile, the control of the remaining two control
In this paper, to achieve wide ZVS range and wide voltage variables is decoupled with the proposed control, making the
gain range for bidirectional power applications, a simple control control easy to be implemented. The working modes, switching
law is proposed for the dual-transformer-based DAB converters control logics, and ZVS constraints of the derived converter with
with minimum power switches. The following features can be phase-shift control are studied. The design of turns ratios for the
obtained with the control law. two transformers is also optimized based on the voltage gain
1) Unlike the methods that need to estimate the operating range and the circulating current.
region online based on system parameters, the proposed con-
trol loop is a unified control. Normally, the operating region II. CONVERTER TOPOLOGY AND OPERATION PRINCIPLE
estimation is needed and based on the value of the output volt-
age, the output current, and the leakage inductance. Because the A. Topology and Modulation Schedule Using
leakage inductance value may vary due to different conditions Phase-Shift Control
such as different operating temperatures, the operating region The dual-transformer-based DAB converter topology is
may not be accurately obtained. With the proposed control, only shown in Fig. 1. It only has six active switches. In the pri-
the input and output voltage are used, and no operation region mary side, the circuit can be divided into two parts including
classification is needed. This means that the proposed control is a conventional full-bridge circuit and an auxiliary half-bridge
less dependent on the converter parameters. Thus, the reliability circuit. The two bridges share the same leg consisting of S1 and
of the control could be improved. S2 . For the output side, it is a half bridge. Lk is the leakage
2) Compared to the other DAB converters with the same inductance at the secondary side acting as a power link for this
number of switches and control degrees of freedom, the ZVS DAB converter. The typical operation waveforms with phase-
range is enlarged and also the current-related loss is reduced. shift control are shown in Fig. 2. It should be noted that only the
The topology has been inspired by the PWM converter in case when 0 < Φ < D1 is taken as an example to illustrate the
[20]. For the derived converter, the duty ratio of one bridge can operation principle, where D1 is the duty cycle of the primary
be fixed as 0.5 without losing ZVS capability. Therefore, a half- side, and Φ is the phase-shift ratio between vD E and vF G . Other
bridge converter can be used at one side of the transformer to cases will be analyzed in the next section.
3308 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 65, NO. 4, APRIL 2018

All of the six switches are driven with a 50% duty cycle. transformers vD E is the same as that of stage 1. vF G is changed
For the primary side, the four switches work the same as a to be V2 /2. In this stage, the transformer leakage current is is
conventional phase-shift full bridge converter. The other two changing with a relatively lower constant slew rate, and its value
capacitors C11 and C12 , together with the leg of S1 and S2 , can be expressed as
work as an additional half bridge with a fixed 50% duty cycle. 
The primary sides of the two transformers are in parallel and is (t − t2 ) = is (t2 ) + (vD E − vF G )(t − t2 )/Lk
(3)
the secondary sides are in series. With this configuration, four vD E = N1 V1 + N2 V1 /2, vF G = V2 /2.
voltage levels can be generated in the vD E waveform and are
controlled with the duty ratio D1 . In the secondary side, the Stage 4 (t3 , t4 ) [see Fig. 3(d)]: At t3 , S4 is turned OFF.
leakage Lk provides the power link between the high-frequency iT 1 starts to discharge the junction capacitor of S3 and charge
transformer output voltage vD E and the output voltage vF G of the junction capacitor of S4 . At the end of this charging pro-
the half bridge in the secondary side. The bidirectional power cess, the body diode conducts to create ZVS for S3 in the next
transfer is controlled by the phase-shift ratio Φ between vD E stage. The charging energy stored in these capacitors is ignored,
and vF G . and the ZVS condition for S3 is
In view of the high-frequency voltage waveform induced on iT 1 (t3 ) = is (t3 )N1 > 0. (4)
the leakage inductor (VD E ), it actually consists of four voltage
levels unlike three voltage levels for the other DAB converter. Stage 5 (t4 , t5 ) [see Fig. 3(e)]: At t4 , S3 is turned ON under
Through a proper method to generate the four voltage levels, ZVS. During this stage, vA C changes to be zero. vD E becomes
the peak current and the reactive current of the converter can N2 V1 /2. The relationship between transformer current and volt-
be tightly controlled when the voltage V1 or V2 changes. This ages can be expressed as
characteristic provides the possibility for the converter to have a 
is (t − t4 ) = is (t4 ) + (vD E − vF G )(t − t4 )/Lk
better performance under wide voltage gain range application. (5)
vD E = N2 V1 /2, vF G = V2 /2.
B. Working Stages of the Converter Stage 6 (t5 , t6 ) [see Fig. 3(f)]: S1 is turned OFF at t5 . During
Since the PWM signals are symmetrical during two half this interval, the junction capacitor of S2 is discharged, and
switching cycles, the mode of operation is analyzed only within its drain–source voltage decreases. At the end of this interval,
one half cycle from t0 to t6 , as shown in Fig. 2. The correspond- the drain–source voltage of S2 is zero, and the bode diode is
ing six working modes are illustrated in Fig. 3. conduced, leading to ZVS turned ON for the next stage. The
Stage 1 (t0 , t1 ) [see Fig. 3(a)]: Prior to t0 , S4 and S6 are ZVS condition for S2 can be shown as
ON, and S1 , S2 , S3 , and S5 are OFF. At t0 , S1 is turned ON.
iT 1 (t3 ) + iT 2 (t3 ) = is (t3 )(N1 + N2 ) > 0. (6)
During this stage, vA C is equal to V1 , and vA B is equal to
V1 /2. Consequently, the total secondary-side voltage of the two
transformers vD E is N1 V1 + N2 V1 /2, and the high-frequency III. ZVS CONSTRAINTS AND CONTROL
voltage vF G generated by the half bridge in V2 side is −V2 /2. A. Current Range for ZVS
The transformer current is starts to increase with a constant slew
rate, and the following relationship is obtained: Similar to many other DAB converters, the converter perfor-
 mance is dependent on more than one control variable. It is
is (t − t0 ) = is (t0 ) + (vD E − vF G )(t − t0 )/Lk controlled by the full-bridge duty cycle D1 and the phase-shift
(1) ratio Φ between vD E and vF G . Different combinations of them
vD E = N1 V1 + N2 V1 /2, vF G = −V2 /2
can have different working patterns, leading to different ZVS
where 1:N1 and 1:N2 are the turns ratios for transformers T1 performances. In the previous section, the case of 0 < Φ < D1 is
and T2 , respectively. taken as an example to study the converter working principles.
Stage 2 (t1 , t2 ) [see Fig. 3(b)]: At time t1 , S6 is turned If all the combinations of D1 and Φ are taken into consider-
OFF. The transformer current is starts to discharge the junc- ation, three more cases should be considered: D1 < Φ < 0.5,
tion capacitor of S5 and to charge the junction capacitor of D1 − 0.5 < Φ < 0, and − 0.5 < Φ < D1 − 0.5. The theoretical
S6 . When the drain–source voltage of S6 is charged to V2 , the waveforms for all the four cases are illustrated, respectively, in
drain–source voltage of S5 is zero, then the body diode will Fig. 4. The cases when Φ > 0 are shown in Fig. 4(a) and (b),
be conducted to create the ZVS turn-on condition for S5 in the and the cases when Φ < 0 are shown in Fig. 4(c) and (d). As
next stage. Because the leakage inductance is relatively large discussed from working stages 2, 4, and 6 for pattern A, which
for DAB converters, the current required to charge/discharge is shown in Fig. 3, ZVS is only determined by the polarity of
the two drain–source capacitors is small and can be neglected the transformer current at the instant when the switch is turned
to simplify ZVS analysis. Hence, the ZVS condition for S5 can ON. According to this principle, current constraints of ZVS can
be obtained as be summed up in Table I.
The expressions for these currents in Table I can be calculated
is (t1 ) > 0. (2)
based on the voltage induced across the leakage inductance
Stage 3 (t2 , t3 ) [see Fig. 3(c)]: At t2 , S5 is turned ON under during each working stage. Taking pattern A for instance, the
ZVS. In this stage, the total secondary-side voltage of the two relationships between the current and the voltages are shown
XU et al.: DUAL-TRANSFORMER-BASED DAB CONVERTER WITH WIDE ZVS RANGE FOR WIDE VOLTAGE CONVERSION GAIN APPLICATION 3309

Fig. 3. Working stages. (a) Stage 1. (b) Stage 2. (c) Stage 3. (d) Stage 4. (e) Stage 5. (f) Stage 6.

Fig. 5. Physical meaning of E = 0.

back to Table I, the relationship between ZVS, D1 , and Φ can

be summed up in Table II.

B. Proposed Control Law to Achieve Full Range of ZVS

for S1 , S2 , S5 , and S6
Fig. 4. Four working patterns. (a) Pattern A: 0 < Φ < D 1 . (b) Pattern B: Based on Table II, the ZVS performance is affected by D1 ,
D 1 < Φ < 0.5. (c) Pattern C: D 1 − 0.5 < Φ < 0. (d) Pattern D: −0.5
< Φ < D 1 − 0.5. Φ, and the two turns ratios N1 and N2 . It is complex to select
their proper combination for achieving wide ZVS range. How-
TABLE I ever, all the expressions in Table II share the same item:
ZVS CURRENT LIMIT FOR DIFFERENT WORKING PATTERNS
E = V2 − N2 V1 − 4D1 N1 V1 . If E is set to be zero, the expres-
sion for S1 and S2 can be easily satisfied regardless of any other
Working patterns S 1 , S 2 (ZVS) S 3 , S 4 (ZVS) S 5 , S 6 (ZVS) variables, implying that ZVS can be achieved independently of
A:0 < Φ < D 1 is (t0 ) < 0 is (t2 ) > 0 is (t1 ) > 0 the transformer turns ratios, load, and two-port voltages. Mean-
B:D 1 < Φ < 0.5 is (t0 ) < 0 is (t1 ) > 0 is (t2 ) > 0 while, ZVS for S3 and S4 can be also achieved independently of
C:D 1 − 0.5 < Φ < 0 is (t0 ) < 0 is (t1 ) > 0 is (t2 ) < 0 the other variables according to Table II. The physical meaning
D:− 0.5 < Φ < D 1 − 0.5 is (t0 ) < 0 is (t2 ) > 0 is (t1 ) < 0
of E = 0 is illustrated in Fig. 5. As shown, the expression of the
voltage–second in a half positive cycle for the two ports of the
leakage inductor voltages (vD E , vF G ) can be calculated as
in (1), (3), and (5). For the transformer current, the dc current 
bias is zero, and the two half cycle waveforms are symmetrical. SA = N2 V1 Ts /4 + N1 V1 D1 Ts
(8)
Therefore, we obtain SB = V2 Ts /4.

is (t1 ) + is (t4 ) = is (t2 ) + is (t5 ) = is (t3 ) + is (t6 ) = 0 If SA = SB , then we obtain
1
 t6
T s t 0 is (t)dt = 0. D1 = (V2 − N2 V1 )/4N1 V1 . (9)
(7)
Then, based on (1), (3), (5), and (7), the current expressions in Substitution of (9) into the expression of E leads to E = 0, and
Table I for pattern A can be obtained. In addition, the current ex- vice versa. Therefore, E = 0 is equivalent to make the half-cycle
pressions for other three working patterns can also be calculated voltage–seconds applied to the two ports of the leakage inductor
by using the same method. Substituting all current expressions to be equal. As a result, this control law is aimed at achieving
3310 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 65, NO. 4, APRIL 2018

TABLE II
ZVS CONSTRAINTS UNDER DIFFERENT WORKING PATTERNS

S 1 , S 2 (ZVS) S 3 , S 4 (ZVS) S 5 , S 6 (ZVS)

A:0 < Φ < D 1 −4V 2 Φ < E 4[V 2 Φ + D 1 (2N 1 V 1 + N 2 V 1 − V 2 )] > E 4(2N 1 + N 2 )V 1 Φ > E
B:D 1 < Φ < 0.5 −4V 2 Φ < E 4[V 2 (D 1 − Φ) + D 1 V 1 (2N 1 + N 2 )] > E 4V 1 (2D 1 N 1 + N 2 Φ) > E
C:D 1 − 0.5 < Φ < 0 −4V 2 |Φ| < E 4[V 2 (D 1 + |Φ|) − D 1 V 1 (2N 1 + N 2 )] > E −4N 2 V 1 |Φ| < −E
D:-0.5 < Φ < D 1 − 0.5 −4V 2 |Φ| < E 2[V 2 (2D 1 − 1 + 2|Φ|) + N 2 V 1 (2D 1 − 1)] > −E −4V 1 [2N 1 (D 1 − 0.5 + |Φ|) + N 2 |Φ|] < −E

E = (V 2 − N 1 V 1 − 4D 1 N 1 V 1 ).

TABLE III
ZVS RESULTS WHEN E = 0 FOR FOUR WORKING PATTERNS

S1 , S2 S3 , S4 S5 , S6

A: AS AS AS
Φ (N 2 + 4 D 1 N 1 )
B: AS N 2 + (2D 1 + 1)N 1 > 2D 1 AS
C: AS 4D 1 N 1 (D 1 + |Φ| − 0.5) < −N 2 |Φ| AS
N 2 (1 −2 D 1 −|Φ |
D: AS D 1 + |Φ| − 0.5 > 4D 1 N 1 AS

AS: always satisfied. Fig. 6. ZVS region for S 3 and S 4 under different D 1 m in . (G m a x =
2G m in , D 1 m a x = 0.5). (a)D 1 m in = 0. (b) D 1 m in = 0.05.

voltage–second balance at the two ports of the leakage inductor.

With E = 0, ZVS results for all the switches can be summarized be 0.5 for the hybrid-bridge-based DAB converter. As a result,
in Table III. As seen, with the control law, ZVS of S1 , S2 , S5 , the two turns ratios can be designed with a proper selection of
and S6 can always be satisfied. ZVS of S3 and S4 in patterns D1m in according to (11).
B, C, and D is dependent on D1 , Φ, and two transformer turns Meanwhile, Fig. 6(a) shows the ZVS region under whole
ratios (N1 and N2 ). power transfer range for different D1m in . The transferred power
P is normalized by Pbase = V22 Ts /16Lk . In Fig. 6(a), D1m in =
C. Transformer Turns Ratio Consideration and Extension 0. When the power is positive, ZVS can be obtained almost in
of ZVS Range for S3 and S4 full ranges except that when D1 is close to zero. When the power
transfer is negative, the ZVS region is limited. Fig. 6(b) shows
With the control law in (9), the relationship between turns an example of changing the minimum value of duty cycle to
ratios and the two-port voltages can be obtained as enlarge ZVS range, in which D1m in is increased from 0 to a
 small value 0.05. As shown in Fig. 6(b), ZVS in positive power
1 = N2 /Gm ax + 4D1m ax N1 /Gm ax
(10) flow can always be satisfied, and ZVS in negative power flow is
1 = N2 /Gm in + 4D1m in N1 /Gm in enlarged compared with the case in Fig. 6(a). This implies that
where Gm in and Gm ax are the minimum and maximum values the ZVS region of S3 and S4 has the possibility to be enlarged
for the voltage gains V2 and V1 , respectively. Also, D1m in and through a proper design of D1m in to determine the two turns
D1m ax are the minimum and maximum values for D1 . Based ratios. Because the design of two transformer turns ratios is
on (10), the two turns ratios can be solved as related to the detailed specifications of the converter such as
 input and output voltage ranges, the detail design will be given
N1 = (Gm ax − Gm in )/(4D1m ax − 4D1m in ) in the later section.
N2 = (D1m ax Gm in − D1m in Gm ax )/(D1m ax − D1m in ).
(11) IV. CONVERTER CHARACTERISTICS WITH THE
As shown in (11), the two transformer turns ratios can be cal- PROPOSED CONTROL
culated based on D1m in and D1m ax when the maximum and
A. Power Characteristics Under the Proposed Control
minimum voltage gains (Gm ax and Gm in ) of the converter are
predetermined. For the proposed converter, D1 can be in the The power expression of the converter can be calculated
range of [0, 0.5]. Since phase-shift control is applied to the V1 based on the power transferred in a switching cycle, which is
side full bridge, circulating current for transformer T1 will exist shown as
if D1 is less than 0.5. The duration of the current circulating  t6
stage can be seen during [t4 , t5 ], as shown in Fig. 2, leading P = vD E is (t)dt /Ts (12)
t0
to high conduction loss. In addition, when D1 = 0.5, with the
proposed control, the voltages applied to the two ports of the le- where t0 and t6 are the starting and ending times of the switching
akage inductor are ensured to be the same except that the phases cycle, respectively, also denoted in Fig. 4. According to Fig. 4
are shifted. This working condition is actually the optimal oper- and the current expressions for the four working patterns, the
ating point for DAB converters. Therefore, D1m ax is designed to transferred power under the proposed control can be obtained
XU et al.: DUAL-TRANSFORMER-BASED DAB CONVERTER WITH WIDE ZVS RANGE FOR WIDE VOLTAGE CONVERSION GAIN APPLICATION 3311

Fig. 9. Implementation of the proposed control.

Fig. 7. Power transfer characteristic.

B. Implementation of the Proposed Control
The diagram for the implementation of the proposed control is
shown in Fig. 9. Only one voltage regulator is needed to control
the V2 -side voltage. With this method, the two power control
variables are decoupled and can be easily obtained based on
simple calculation. The phase-shift ratio Φ is controlled through
a PI regulator, and the duty cycle control signal is calculated
with the sampling of two voltages according to the control law
shown in (9). Based on Φ and D1 , the PWM unit generates
Fig. 8. Operation regions of different patterns. (a) G m a x = 2G m in . the corresponding driving signals according to Fig. 2. Unlike
(b) G m a x = 4G m in . the other complex control strategies to achieve wide ZVS range
under wide voltage gain range, this control is quite simple and
as follows: can be implemented easily with a microcontroller.
⎧
4P [(4D 1 Φ−2D 12 +D 1 −4Φ 2 )N 1 +(Φ−2Φ 2 )N 2 ]
⎪
⎪ PA = b a s e
⎪
⎪ (N 2 +4D 1 N 1 ) V. DESIGN CONSIDERATION
⎪
⎪ 2 2
⎨PB = 4P b a s e [(D 1 +2D 1 −4D 1 Φ)N 1 +(Φ−2Φ N 2 )] In this section, a design example of the proposed converter
N 2 +4D 1 N 1
⎪
⎪ N (2D 2 +8D Φ 2 −D ) with V1 = 120–240 V, V2 = 96 V, and Po = 1 kW is intro-
⎪ PC = 4Pbase (2Φ2 + Φ − 1 N12 +4D 11 N 1 1 )
⎪
⎪ duced. The maximum voltage gain Gm ax = 96/120, and the
⎪
⎩ 4P [(2D 12 −4D 1 Φ−3D 1 +4Φ 2 +4Φ+1)N 1 +(2Φ 2 +Φ)N 2 ]
PD = b a s e N 2 +4D 1 N 1
minimum voltage gain Gm in = 96/240. The gain range of the
(13) converter is wide as Gm ax is twice of Gm in . A 50-kHz switching
where PA , PB , PC , and PD are the power functions for patterns frequency is adopted.
A–D, respectively. Then, based on the Φ range for different In the DAB converter design, normally, it is the maximum
patterns, the power transfer of the converter with the proposed power transfer instead of voltage gain that matters more. Be-
control can be expressed as cause the output voltage is fixed in the design case, the converter
⎧ will work as long as it can have the maximum power transfer
⎪
⎪ PA , 0 < Φ < D1 ability under the heaviest load. With a particular control, the
⎪
⎨P , D < Φ < 0.5
B 1 maximum power transfer of a DAB converter is inversely pro-
P (Φ, D1 ) = (14)
⎪
⎪ PC , D1 − 0.5 < Φ < 0 portional to the leakage inductance. Therefore, first, a leakage
⎪
⎩ inductance can be properly designed to obtain the maximum
PD , −0.5 < Φ < D1 − 0.5.
power transfer. Then, for the turns ratio of the transformer de-
The plot for (14) is shown in Fig. 7. For different D1 , the max- sign, the goal is aimed at both achieving wide ZVS range and
imum power transfer changes. Also, for a particular D1 , P(Φ, reducing the reactive current loss.
D1 ) is similar to a sinusoid waveform. To ensure that the power
transfer is monotonously increased with the increasing of Φ, Φ A. Leakage Inductance Design
should have both lower and upper limits in the whole operation
The leakage inductance provides a power link between V1
range. According to (13) and (14), the operation regions for the
and V2 , and it should be designed to allow the maximum power
four working patterns under different input voltages and differ-
transfer. According to the power expression in (14), the global
ent output powers can be plotted in Fig. 8. As seen in Fig. 8(a),
maximum power transfer for all the Φ and D1 is shown as
the converter mainly works in the regions of patterns A and C.
Pattern B only occurs when D1 is relatively small in positive Pm ax = 0.42Pbase = 0.42V22 Ts /(16Lk ). (15)
power flow. Pattern D occurs when D1 is large under reverse po-
twer flow. When the maximum voltage gain over minimum volt- In practice, 80% margin is given to allow dynamic responses.
age gain is increased to 4, as shown in Fig. 8(b), the regions of Hence, the limit for Lk can be shown as
patterns A and B become smaller, and the region of pattern C
becomes larger. Lk ≤ 0.23V22 Ts /(16Pm ax ) = 2.65 μH. (16)
3312 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 65, NO. 4, APRIL 2018

Fig. 10. Leakage inductor current comparison when L k changes under

rated load. (a) RMS current. (b) Peak current.

Equation (16) sets up an upper limit to the leakage induc-

tance for the maximum power transfer. One example for the
leakage inductor RMS current and peak current when the leak-
Fig. 11. RMS current under different D m in values at rated load.
age inductance is smaller than the upper limit are shown in (a) T 1 primary current. (b) T 2 primary current. (c) T 1 circulating current.
Fig. 10. Fig. 10(a) and (b) illustrates the RMS current and peak (d) Secondary current.
current of the leakage inductor with different values. When V1
changes from 140 to 240 V, both the peak current and the RMS
current will increase if the leakage inductance becomes smaller.
This means high turn-off current and high device RMS current,
leading to a higher rating for the device chosen and also higher
conduction loss and turn-off loss. In addition, the leakage in-
ductance is also related to the converter dynamic response. In
theory, the converter would have faster response if the leakage
inductance is lower. In our design, the loss is considered to have
a higher priority. Therefore, Lk is chosen to be close to the upper Fig. 12. ZVS region for S 3 and S 4 and improvement. (G m a x =
boundary, which is 2.6 μH. 2G m in , D 1 m a x = 0.5). (a)D 1 m in = 0. (b)D 1 m in = 0.05.

B. Turns Ratios circulating current and lower RMS current for the secondary
With the given specifications of Gm in and Gm ax , substitution side should be around 0 or 0.05.
of these values along with D1m ax = 0.5 into (11) leads to Meanwhile, as mentioned before in Section III, the ZVS re-
 gion of S3 and S4 is related to the value of D1m in . The cases for
N1 = 1/(5 − 10D1m in ) the ZVS region under different D1m in are shown in Fig. 12. As
(17)
N2 = (2 − 8D1m in )/(5 − 10D1m in ). shown, if D1m in is chosen to be slightly larger than 0, the ZVS
region can be changed. Unlike the case when D1m in = 0, ZVS
According to (17), to ensure that N1 and N2 are positive val- under all the positive power flow conditions can be achieved, and
ues, D1m in should be limited as 0 ≤ D1m in < 0.25. Besides, the ZVS region under reverse power flow is enlarged. Therefore,
based on (17), if D1m in is determined, the value for both N2 and the minimum duty cycle is designed as D1m in = 0.05 to obtain
N1 can be directly solved from (17). Therefore, the design of wider ZVS ranges and also smaller RMS current performance.
the two turns ratios can be simplified to find an optimal value for Then, according to (17), the two turns ratios can be obtained as
D1m in , which obtains wide ZVS range and low current-related N1 = 29 and N2 = 11 4
.
loss. In Fig. 11, RMS currents for the two transformers and the
circulating current of transformer T1 are compared for different VI. COMPARISON
D1m in at the rated load condition. In Fig. 11(a) and (b), the
primary currents for transformers T1 and T2 are illustrated, re- A. Device RMS and Device Turn-Off Current
Comparison
spectively. As D1m in decreases from 0.2 to 0, T1 primary current
is decreasing and T2 primary current is increasing within whole The RMS currents and turn-off currents of all the devices are
input voltage ranges. If D1m in becomes smaller, the circulating presented in Fig. 13 for a dual-transformer-based DAB converter
current of T1 will have less impact on the power transfer be- with the proposed control and designed turns ratios under rated
cause of the reduced total RMS current, which corresponds to load. Also, the comparisons have been made with a conventional
Fig. 11(c). As shown in Fig. 11(c), the RMS circulating current half-bridge DAB (CHDAB) converter consisting a full bridge at
is lower if D1m in becomes smaller such as 0 and 0.05. Fig. 11(d) the V1 side and a half bridge at the V2 side. The EPS control in
shows the RMS current of the secondary side. The cases when [8] aimed at achieving wide ZVS range is applied to the CHDAB
D1m in ≥ 0.1 are also not preferred because the RMS currents converters, and the turns ratio is designed to be 1:2/5 to make
are much higher than the other cases when the input voltage the voltage matching occur at 120 V. The leakage inductance
is higher than 180 V. The better cases to gain the minimum value is 2.6 μH.
XU et al.: DUAL-TRANSFORMER-BASED DAB CONVERTER WITH WIDE ZVS RANGE FOR WIDE VOLTAGE CONVERSION GAIN APPLICATION 3313

Fig. 13. Device RMS and turn-off current comparison under rated
power (P o = 1 kW). (a) Device RMS current comparison. (b) Device
turn-off current comparison.

As illustrated in Fig. 13(a), the RMS current of secondary-

side devices for the CHDAB converter will increase greatly as
V1 increases from 120 to 240 V, while the RMS current of Fig. 14. ZVS ranges comparison for switches. (a) S 5 and S 6 for the
secondary-side devices (S5 and S6 denoted in Fig. 1) almost dual-transformer-based DAB converter. (b) S 5 and S 6 for the CHDAB
keeps the same for the dual-bridge-based DAB converter. For converter. (c) S 3 and S 4 for the dual-transformer-based DAB converter.
(d) S 3 and S 4 for the CHDAB converter.
the primary-side devices, all the four devices have the same RMS
current value for the CHDAB converter, while two devices (S1
and S2 ) have higher RMS current and the other two (S3 and S4 )
have lower RMS current for the dual-transformer-based DAB
converter. Therefore, in view of the total conduction loss in the
primary side, the dual-transformer-based DAB converter can
have smaller losses especially when the input voltage becomes
high. Fig. 13(b) shows the device turn-off current comparison
of each device. For the secondary-side devices, the device turn-
off current of the dual-transformer-based converter is larger.
Fig. 15. Power distribution of the two transformers.
However, ZVS is lost for the CHDAB converter when the input
voltage is larger than 160 V because the current is zero and
cannot charge/discharge the junction capacitor to satisfy the
ZVS condition. The device turn-off current of S1 and S2 for the
CHDAB converter is smaller than that for the dual-transformer-
based DAB converter. However, for switches S3 and S4 , the
device turn-off current of the CHDAB converter is more than
twice larger than the one for the dual-transformer-based DAB
converter.

B. ZVS Range Comparison

Fig. 14(a) and (b) shows the ZVS region comparison of the Fig. 16. Photo of the prototype.
secondary-side devices. For the dual-transformer-based con-
verter, ZVS can be achieved for the switches during the whole
operating load and voltage ranges. However, for the CHDAB T1 (PT 1 ) decreases, while the power of transformer T2 (PT 2 ) in-
converter, ZVS can only be achieved in a limited region. creases. Under the whole operation range, the maximum power
Fig. 14(c) and (d) shows the ZVS region comparison of switches for transformer T2 is 935 W, and the maximum power for tran-
S3 and S4 . In both figures, ZVS can be achieved when the power sformer T1 is 555 W. If the area-product (AP) method is used
flow is positive. When the power is negative, ZVS will be lost in for selection of the core, the AP value of the converter is 50%
some operation regions. In view of the areas of the ZVS region, larger than that of the conventional converter design.
the one for dual-transformer-based converter is slightly smaller
than for the CHDAB converter. VII. EXPERIMENTAL VERIFICATION
In addition, full ZVS range for the leading leg (S1 and S2 )
A laboratory prototype was built to verify the effectiveness of
can be obtained for both two topologies.
the dual-transformer-based converter and the proposed control.
The specifications are the same as in the last section. In addition,
C. Transformer Size Comparison the capacitance for the V1 side is C11 = C12 = 20 μF, and the
The transferred power for the two transformers with different capacitance for the V2 side is C21 = C22 = 40 μF. The estab-
input voltages are shown in Fig. 15. As seen, when the input lished experimental prototype is shown in Fig. 16. The prototype
voltage increases from 120 to 240 V, the power of transformer includes five parts: an auxiliary power supply board, a sampling
3314 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS, VOL. 65, NO. 4, APRIL 2018

Fig. 19. Switches ZVS waveforms under V 1 = 120 V for different loads.
(a) 200 W, S 1 . (b) 200 W, S 3 . (c) 200 W, S 5 . (d) 1000 W, S 1 . (e) 1000 W,
S 3 . (f) 1000 W, S 5 .

Fig. 17. Experimental waveforms under 1 kW. (a) V 1 = 120 V.

Fig. 20. Switches ZVS waveforms under V 1 = 180 V for different loads.
(b) V 1 = 150 V. (c) V 1 = 180 V. (d) V 1 = 210 V. (e) V 1 = 240 V.
(a) 200 W, S 1 . (b) 200 W, S 3 . (c) 200 W, S 5 . (d) 1000 W, S 1 . (e) 1000 W,
S 3 . (f) 1000 W, S 5 .

Fig. 18. Experimental waveforms under 200 W. (a) V 1 = 120 V.

(b) V 1 = 150 V. (c) V 1 = 180 V. (d) V 1 = 240 V.

board, a control board, a driver board, and the main circuit. The
controller TMS320F28335 from TI Company is used to imple-
ment the control. The sampling rate of the control is the same Fig. 21. Experimental waveforms under load step changing for different
as the switching frequency 50 kHz. FDA38N30 from Fairchild input voltages V 1 = 120 V: (a) half to full load; (b) full to half load.
is used for the primary-side devices, and FQA90N15 is used for V 1 = 180 V: (c) half to full load; (d) full to half load. V 1 = 180 V: (e) half
to full load; (f) full to half load.
the secondary-side devices.
The experimental waveforms under rated power Po = 1 kW
are shown in Fig. 17. vA B and vA C are the primary-side volt- D1 is at its maximum value of 0.5. With the proposed control,
ages of the two transformers, respectively, and vF G is the voltage the converter works at a condition exactly the same as the opti-
generated by the half bridge in the V2 side. is is the current of mal operating point for conventional DAB converters with SPS
leakage inductance Lk , whose polarity at switch turn-on instant control. Consequently, ZVS is easily achieved as seen from the
determines the ZVS performance. As shown in Fig. 17(a), when polarity of the current at the moment when the switches turn ON.
V1 = 120 V, vA B and vA C are both square waveforms, and Lower conduction loss can also be obtained. Meanwhile, when
XU et al.: DUAL-TRANSFORMER-BASED DAB CONVERTER WITH WIDE ZVS RANGE FOR WIDE VOLTAGE CONVERSION GAIN APPLICATION 3315

Fig. 22. Efficiency comparisons under different voltages. (a) 120 V. (b) 180 V. (c) 240 V.

V1 increases, such as 150, 180, and 210 V in Fig. 17(b)–(d), converter, especially under the light-load condition. Meanwhile,
respectively, the duty cycle is gradually decreased to obtain the for the dual-transformer-based converter with the proposed con-
voltage–second balance between the voltages at the two ports of trol, even though the converter has a similar RMS current for
the leakage inductance. As seen from the relationship between each devices, the efficiency with V1 = 180 V is higher because
the duty cycle and phase-shift ratio in these cases, the converter it has lower transformer loss and turn-off loss.
works in pattern A when V1 = 150 and 180 V and in pattern B
when V1 = 180 V. These match with the theoretical waveforms VIII. CONCLUSION
shown in Fig. 4(a). In addition, judging from the current polar-
In this paper, a control law was proposed to achieve wide
ities of is at the turn-on instants, ZVS is achieved for all the
ZVS range for dual-transformer-based DAB converters for wide
three cases. When V1 = 240 V as seen from Fig. 17(e), D1 is
voltage gain range applications. The characteristics of the dual-
almost zero; therefore, the two voltages applied to Lk are almost
transformer-based DAB converters with phase-shift control have
the same with the case in Fig. 17(a), which explains why is is
been analyzed. Based on that, the duty ratio of one bridge can be
similar for the two cases. At the two boundary input voltage
fixed as 0.5 without loss of ZVS capability. Therefore, the half-
values, the converter can automatically shift the working mode
bridge converter is used at one side of the transformer to reduce
to achieve low peak current and circulating current.
the total switching numbers and eliminate one control variable.
Fig. 18 shows the experimental waveforms at light-load con-
The proposed control is less dependent on the converter pa-
ditions (Po = 200 W). As seen in Fig. 18(a) and (d), the wave-
rameters, and no classification of the working modes is needed
forms are also similar, and both of them are working in the
for real-time control. With the proposed method, four switches
optimal operating condition when full ZVS ranges and low con-
of the converter can achieve full range of ZVS. The other two
duction loss can be obtained. As for the cases when V1 = 150
switches can achieve full-range ZVS under positive power flow,
and 180 V, the converter works in the region of pattern C, which
while a slightly reduced ZVS region under reverse power flow.
matches with the theoretical waveforms shown in Fig. 4(c).
The power transfer characteristics, ZVS performance, and turns
Also, ZVS for the switches can be obtained judging from the
ratios design have been introduced in this paper. A 1-kW proto-
polarity of the current at each turn-on instant.
type has been built up to verify the effectiveness of the proposed
The soft switching experimental results for different input
control and the dual-transformer-based converter. The results
voltages under different loads are shown in Figs. 19 and 20.
show that the studied converter with the proposed control is an
The switch drain-to-source voltage, the switch gate voltage, and
attractive candidate for the applications requiring wide conver-
the leakage inductor current are captured for each subfigure. As
sion gain range and bidirectional power flow.
illustrated, ZVS can be achieved both at light load (200 W) and
heavy load (1 kW) under different input voltages.
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