Switch-mode dc-ac inverters: dc-sinusoidal ac

Switch-mode dc-to-ac inverters are used in

- Ac motor drives
- Uninterruptible ac power supplies
Where the objective is to produce a sinusoidal ac output whose magnitude and frequency
can both be controlled.
To be precise, the switch-mode inverter is a converter through which the power flow is
reversible. However, most of the time the power flow is from the dc side to the motor on
the ac side, requiring inverter mode of operation. Therefore, these switch-mode
converters are often referred to as switch mode inverters.
To slow down the ac motor, the kinetic energy associated with the inertia of the motor and
its load is recovered and the ac motor acts as a generator. During the braking of the motor,
the power flows from the ac to the dc side of the SMC, and it operates in a rectifier
mode.
The energy recovered during breaking

VSIs: voltage source inverters.

The VSIs can be further divided into the following three general categories:
1. PWM INVERTERS: the input dc voltage is essentially constant in magnitude where
a diode rectifier is used to rectify the line voltage. Therefore, the inverter must
control the magnitude and the frequency of the ac output voltages. This is
achieved by PWM of the inverter switches and hence such inverters are called
PWM inverters.

There are various schemes to PW modulate the inverter switches in order to shape
the output ac voltages to be as close to a sinewave as possible.

2. SQUARE-WAVE-INVERTERS. In these inverters, the input dc voltage is

controlled in order to control the magnitude of the output ac voltage, and
therefore the inverter has to control only the frequency of the output voltage.
The output ac voltage has a waveform similar to A SQUARE WAVE, and hence
these inverters are called square wave invertes.

3. SINGLE-PHASE INVERTERS WITH VOLTAGE CANCELATION. In case of

inverters with single phase output, it is possible to control the magnitude and
the frequency of the inverter output voltage, EVENN THOUGH THE INPUT
TO THE INVERTER IS A CONSTANT DC VOLTAGE. And the inverter
switches are NOT pulse-width modulated (and hence the output voltage
waveshape is like a square wave).

Therefore, these inverters combine the characteristics of the previous two inverters.
It should be note that the voltage cancellation technique works only with single-
phase inverters and not with three-phase inverters.