“Since its launch, the TL-PMLK has been used worldwide to bridge the gap between power theory and real-world applications for engineering students and professionals. Würth Elektronik eiSos has contributed its deep expertise in the field of inductive components to this new version of the TI-PLMK to provide users with an even deeper understanding of the processes involved in power electronics,” says Ayesha Mayhugh, product manager for the Texas Instruments University Program.
The kit consists of a printed circuit board and a book.
The printed circuit board comprises two independent Buck converters with six different inductors, which can be selected individually. The test kit allows users to examine the performance of inductors with different core materials and sizes and analyze their influence on the static and dynamic power of the regulators.
Each converter circuit has adjustable operating conditions, such as a flexible switching frequency between 100 and 700 kHz, allowing observation of its effects on the inductors and the study of switching regulators with different coils.
The two regulator circuits have an EMC input filter to analyze the effect of the inductors on conducted noise attenuation. Furthermore, the performance of the filters can be compared by selecting inductors according to different design strategies.
Each regulator circuit incorporates overvoltage, overcurrent, and reverse polarity protection to prevent damage to the printed circuit board. The current transformers and current shunts integrated into the printed circuit board allow for easy current measurement using standard voltage testers.
In addition to the hardware, a manual with detailed test series helps users examine the board. Six experiments can be performed independently under steady-state, transient, and dynamic conditions, typical of real-world scenarios.
The kit enables the analysis of the inductance of different coils, the investigation of their saturation and thermal behavior, the estimation of DC and AC losses, the measurement of ripple current and voltage, and the observation of continuous and discontinuous operating modes and transient response.
