CHARACTERIZATION AND SNUBBING OF A BIDIRECTIONAL MCT SWITCH IN A RESONANT AC LINK CONVERTER

The MOS-Controlled Thyristor (MCT) is emerging as a powerful switch th at combines the characteristics of existing power devices, This paper presents a study of switching stresses on the MCT under zero voltage r esonant switching. Two MCT's and two diodes are connected to form a bi directional switch which was used in an ac/ac resonant link inverter, Current and voltage spikes are observed and analyzed with variations i n the timing of the MCT switching. Different snubber circuit configura tions are investigated to minimize the effect of these transients, Som e failure modes of the device are also presented.