Electro-Thermo-Mechanical Analysis of High-Power Press-Pack Insulated Gate Bipolar Transistors under Various Mechanical Clamping Conditions

Abstract

With the continuously increasing demand for energy and the limited supply of fossil fuels, renewable power sources are becoming ever more important. Knowing that future energy demand will grow, manufacturers are increasing the size of new wind turbines (WTs) in order to reduce the cost of energy production. The reliability of the components has a large impact on the overall cost of a WT, and press-pack (PP) insulated gate bipolar transistors (IGBTs) could be a good solution for future multi-megawatt WTs because of advantages like high power density and reliability. When used in power converters, PP IGBTs are stacked together with other components in a clamping mechanism in order to ensure electrical and thermal contact. Incorrect mechanical clamping of PP IGBTs has a negative impact on their reliability and consequently on the reliability of the WT. In this study the impact of mechanical clamping conditions on the static thermal distribution among chips in PP IGBTs is investigated.

Variable Heat Disturbance Observer for Control of Peltier Device

“…The heat flow generated from a Peltier device includes heat from a Peltier effect, a Joule heat, and heat interference inside the device. The thermal system is modeled based on a thermal network method (28) (29) that a thermal behavior is expressed as a electric circuit. In this paper, the heat flow generated from a Peltier device is expressed as…”

Electro-thermo-mechanical modelling and analysis of the press pack diode in power electronics

“…Finite element analysis (FEA) as a modelling and analysis tool of press packs has been undertaken by many researchers. A FEA study on press pack insulated bipolar transistor (PPIGBT) was presented by Busca et al [4] for the impact of mechanical clamping pressure on the thermal distribution among the chips. Another thermo mechanical FEA study on PPIGBT was reported by Poller et al [5 and 6] who investigated the effect of external clamping pressure on the thermo mechanical behavior of an IGBT chip.…”

Thermal and Mechanical Analyses of Clamping Area on the Performance of Press-Pack IGBT in Series-Connection Stack Application

“…Since PP IGBTs abandon wire bonding connections, both electrical connections and thermal dissipation use a press pack, and the connection state of each chip is linked to the current path and cooling capacity [6]. The failure test developed by Poller shows that micro-electrical discharge is a possible failure mode and is caused by lost contact between metal layers [7].…”

“…As the clamping force increases, the on-state voltage and contact resistance of the PP IGBTs decreases [22]. In addition, the stress distribution is affected by the geometric structure of the fixture [6]. The clamping fixture with a cylindrical shape is a better choice for maintaining the internal stress and temperature distribution.…”