Location: 20-104
Coordinator: Dr. Taufik
Facilities: EE 410, EE 411, EE 433, EE 527
Size: 914
Average Number of Students a Year: 45
Utilization Ratio: 0.05

Description

The power electronics lab at Cal Poly is aimed to accommodate the instructional laboratory activities for power electronic courses offered at Cal Poly State University. The lab facilitates faculty and students who are conducting research, theses, industry sponsored projects in power converters in particular and electrical energy conversion in general. In addition, the lab has been used to accommodate for technical workshop in power electronics. Currently, the lab houses a total of 8 benches consisting of 6 instructional lab benches (Figure 1) and 2 senior project/thesis benches (Figure 2).

Figure 1. Instructional lab bench

Figure 2. Senior project/Thesis benches

Over the past few years, the power electronics lab has received generous cash and equipment donations from the following companies:

• Texas Instruments
• Enerpro Inc.
• Rockwell Automation (Allen-Bradley)
• Linear Technology
• Visalia Electric Motor Shop
• Raytheon
• QuickSilver Control
• Rantec

In terms of research activity, the lab has drawn interest from power electronic companies in the form of either student projects or consulting projects that make use of the power electronic lab. As an example, APD Semiconductor (acquired by Diodes, Inc.) conducted student projects on the Super Barrier Rectifier diode in 2006 which involved as many as 15 undergraduate students. Faculty have also utilized the lab for their research, such as the SuPER (Sustainable Power for Energy Resource) project which has already produced senior projects and master’s theses. Lastly, the power electronic lab has recently produced prototypes of 2 new multiphase topologies recently filed for US Patents by Cal Poly.

For further information on how we may assist you in your power electronic related project or for any other information, please contact Dr. Taufik via email taufik@calpoly.edu or phone number (805) 756-2318.

Current Equipment

Each instructional lab bench has the following equipment:

• Access to single-phase and three-phase ac power, and dc power
• Three single-phase transformers, inductors, capacitors
• Three-phase wattmeter and single-phase wattmeter
• Oscilloscope, power scope, multimeters, bench dual dc power supply
• Current probe amplifier, pulse generators
• Power diode module, power thyristor module, triac-diac module, thyristor firing board
• DC-DC converter module, active PFC circuit
• 2-HP AC Drives, 1/4-HP dc drives, inverter-rated induction motor, dc motor
• Personal computer with OrCAD Pspice, Matlab

The two senior project/thesis/research benches are equipped with the following equipment:

• ESR meter and LCR meter
• Fluke 43B and PowerSight Power Analyzers
• Adjustable AC source supply, and high-voltage/current DC power supplies
• Oscilloscopes and personal computers
• Electronic Loads
• Venable Frequency Response Analyzer
• Digital Multimeters, Thermo-coupling meter, AC wattmeter
• Pulse generator
• Soldering stations
• Temperature Humidity chamber

Equipment Needs

• 7 units of electronic load (30 A max)
• 7 units of power scopemeter
• 7 units of dual channel Oscilloscopes (100 MHz or higher)
• 21 units of digital multimeter
• 7 units of variable ac source generator
• 7 units of ac single-phase and three phase power meter
• 7 units of pulse generator
• 7 units of dynamometer
• 1 unit of network analyzer
• 1 unit of temperature chamber
• 1 unit of thermal camera