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400 kW RF pulse generators with programmable waveforms

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Meas. Sci. Technol. 2 (1991) 581-585. Printed in t h e UK

400 kW RF pulse generators with programmable rvaveforms

G Bessont and G R Conrell School o Physical Sciences, Flinders University of South Australia, Bedford Park, f 5042, Australia

Received 22 February 1990, in final form 22 November 1990, accepted for publication 4 March 1991 paper describes new high-power RF generators that are designed for use in plasma physics research. Conventional vacuum tube final amplifiers are driven by amplitude-modulated generators that utilize power MOSFETS. The RF carriers and their phase relationship are developed in digital logic circuits and modulated using information pre-programmed from a personal computer.
Abstract. This

1. Introduction

The rotamak (Jones 1979) is a compact torus device in which a rotating magnetic field (rotating in planes normal to the z axis, see figure 1) is used to generate and maintain the toroidal plasma current. Equilibrium requires an additional, externally generated poloidal field (the 'vertical field' of the tokamak) to counteract the natural tendency of the toroidal plasma ring to expand. The steady component of the resultant poloidal magnetic field consists of the combination of closed and open field lines shown in figure 1. The rotating magnetic field (RMF) current drive scheme is an example of the more general, low phase velocity ( j x b ) method of driving plasma current. A basic, qualitative description of the technique can be found in Jones (1986). Both theoretical and experimental investigations have shown that, provided the values of the amplitude and frequency of the RMF are suitably chosen, the penetration of an applied RMF into a plasma need not be limited by the classical skin effect and the enhanced penetration is accompanied by a rotation of the electron fluid, the main fluid remaining at rest. In this way, an electron current is produced. In a typical rotamak device, the applied RMF is generated by feeding RF currents of the same amplitude and frequency, but dephased by 90", to two orthogonally oriented Helmholtz coils located on the outside of the discharge vessel (see figure 1). Rotamak research has progressed through a sequence of experimental stages, each characterized by the parameters of the RF current source used to produce the applied RMF. At the start of rotamak research (around 1979), it was decided that, in the absence of any guidance as to the appropriate amplitude for the RMF, as large a value
ton leave from: Centre de Recherches en Physique des Plasmas, E ~ Polytechnique Fkdirale, 21 AV.des Bains, 1007 Lausanne, ~ ~ c
Switzerland.
0957-0233191/070581+OS $03.50

as practical would be used. This decision led to the need for very large RF powers, an embracing of the relatively inexpensive RF line generator technology (Hugrass et al 1980, Stephan et al 1982) and, as a consequence, the disadvantage of having to use short-duration RF pulses (approximately 80 p).In a second series of experiments, the duration of the rotamak discharges was significantly extended (from 80 ps to 9 ms). These long-duration RF pulses were generated using conventional vacuum tube technology. Financial constraints, however, limited the level of the input power to the plasma to a very modest 6 kW. In the third, and latest, series of experiments, the RF supplies provided input powers of about SO kW and the duration of the pulses was increased to approximately 40 ms. Rotamak experiments which have been conducted to date suggest that compact torus plasmas of real interest (is. n,21018-1019m-3, T,sIOOeV) will only be produced in rotamak devices if the RF input power to the discharge is increased so that it lies in the 400500 kW range, that is, a ten-fold increase over what was previously available. A new rotamak device has been designed and constructed at Flinders University over the past two years and the purpose of this paper is to describe the two 400 kW RF supplies which power it.

2. Design conslderatlons

To successfully drive plasma loads, the RF supplies must be capable of withstanding a severe .load mismatch. Although nominally 50 R, the load varies considerably as the plasma configuration settles or if the plasma disrupts. A traditional push-pull power amplifier utilizing pulse modulator power triodes was chosen to meet this criterion. The pair of 400 kW RF supplies require high-power, high-tension (HT) supplies. The traditional technique of
581

1991 iOP Publishing Ltd

G Besson and G R

Figure 1. T h e rotamak compact torus configuration.

using a capacitor bank as a HT supply in a pulsed application could not he overlooked as all the necessary components were .available from previous experiments. The most serious problem facing the user with this technique is the droop in capacitor bank voltage producing a corresponding reduction in output power. A plasma load matched at the beginning of the discharge may be poorly matched near the end, or even worse, may disrupt. To overcome this problem each amplifier is operated in class B and driven from a variahleamplitude RF supply. If the power output of this driver is increased to cancel the corresponding droop in the output amplifier, the result is a constant-amplitude RF burst. This, however, limits the maximum power available from the RF supplies as the full power capnot be maintained for the entire 40 ms. To provide these and other experimentally useful requirements, the shape of the envelope or burst of RF power is programmable. The output power required of the driver amplifiers is approximately 12 kW. Conventionally this would be

implemented using at least three stages of linear amplifiers, the last of which would use power vacuum tubes. The design described in section 3 uses a single stage, composed of combined solid state switching amplifiers driving a series resonant load. The size of this arrangement is approximately one tenth that of a conventional amplifier of the same power and it is less than a quarter of the cost. A serious problem with high-power RF amplifiers is coupling from the output or associated noise to the small controlling signals. This is overcome firstly by the use of fibre optics separating the power amplifiers from the oscillator. Secondly, as the driver is a switching amplifier, all carrier information is in digital form, which has much better noise immunity than small analogue signals.

3. Description

A block diagram of the RF supplies is shown in figure 2. The supplies consist of a driver controller that sends

Driver Amplifier
Driver Controller

Power Amplifier
Plasma

Driver Amplifier
Personal computer

Amplifier

Figure 2.
582

RF

supply block diagram.

400 kW RF pulse generators

carrier, phase and amplitude information to the driver amplifiers, which in turn drive the final power amplifiers.
3.1. Driver controller

A block diagram of the controller is shown in figure 3. The 500 kHz carrier signals are produced by dividing a 50 MHz oscillator by 100. One of these carriers is delayed using counters at the 50 MHz rate to produce the 90" phase difference between carriers. The counters' delay resolution is 20 ns. A switchable IO ns delay controlled by the LSB (low significant bit) of the delay data byte improves this resolution to IO ns. Phase errors in the power amplifiers and load matching circuits can he compensated for using this control, to achieve the required 90" phaseshift in load currents producing the
RMF.

IRFP450

Flgure 4. Single stage.

Amplitude modulation of the driver amplifiers is achieved by pulse-width modulating (PWM) the carriers. The modulating signals are produced using a programmable waveform generator. These signals are defined by 40 eight-bit digital values corresponding to the desired amplitude at 1 ms intervals during the RF burst. These waveform data are downloaded from a personal computer and stored in non-volatile memory. To allow for various experimental requirements, 30 such waveforms can be stored simultaneously in the controller. The two modulated digital carrier signals are transmitted to the driver amplifiers using inexpensive plastic fibre optics. Although designed for 500 kHz, minor modifications to the existing controller would allow operation at frequencies up to 1 MHz. The limiting components are the modulators and fibre optics both of which could he improved to allow operation in excess of 5 MHz, well above the limit of the driver amplifiers. The controller is located in the laboratory near the operator, and housed in a five-unit high standard 19-inch rackmounted box.
3.2. Driver amplifiers

The necessary drive power is provided by combining 12 amplifiers. A schematic diagram of one of these switching amplifiers is shown in figure 4, and six such amplifiers

are built on one PCB (printed circuit hoard). This design has advantages over conventional linear amplifiers capable of the same power, in size, cost, efficiency and noise immunity. The amplifiers require no expensive HT supply and elaborate cooling as do high-power vacuum tube amplifiers. Power MOSFETS were used as the switching devices. Typical achievable drain current switching time, with complementary emitter follower gate drive, is in the order of 20 ns, making the devices useful for HF amplifiers. A single amplifier produces in excess of 1.2 kW into I O a at an efficiency of 70%. Combining the 12 amplifiers at 500 kHz requires nothing other than a series-parallel connection as shown in figure 5. The balanced load is shared equally and presents a l O Q load to each amplifier. If such an amplifier were to be operated above 1 MHz, hybrid combining would become necessary as delays and differences in switching time between stages would become significant. To ensure equal power sharing, each amplifier's output impedance of approximately 4 0 would need to he increased if more stages are to he combined. This has the effect of reducing efficiency and eventually a more complex combining network would become necessary. A practical limit to the maximum power using this technique would be of the order of 100 kW. As shown in figure 5, the combined amplifiers are series resonated with the load. The Q of 7 is sufficient

Figure 3. Driver controller block diagram 583

G Bessoo and G R Cottrell

Flgure 8. Flgure 5.

Power amplifier schematic diagram.

Combined stages.

4. Measured performance

to filter the switching amplifiers output. Power dissipation in a supplies switching element consists of a constant and a switching component. The constant component is the device-on resistance multiplied by the RMS current squared. Switching dissipation is a result of the device operating in a linear region whilst tuming on and off, and increases with the operating frequency. By series resonating the load, the switching losses in the MOSFET are negligible as, during the switching time, the load current is at a minimum. The series resonant circuit is the only tuned element in the driver amplifiers, and if required, could be adjusted to any desired frequency between 300 kHz and 1 MHz. These limits are imposed by the individual amplifiers transformers and the combining technique. Each grid driver is supplied by a 90 V 0.6 F capacitor hank, consisting of forty 15 000 pF electrolytic capacitors. The current from this bank at 15 kW RMS into the load is 230 A. A constant-current supply of 1 A recharges the capacitor hank between discharges.
3.3. Power amplifiers

A photograph of an unmodulated RF current pulse is shown in figurel. The output power droops from 430 kW to 160 kW as a result of the capacitor hanks discharging in both the driver and power amplifier. A flat 200kW pulse produced by increasing the drive power during the discharge is shown in figure 8. Experi-

Figure 7.

Unmodulated pulse.

The amplifiers are of traditional class B push-pull design and a simplified schematic diagram is shown in figure 6. The most important feature of the design is its tolerance to extremely poor loads. Machlett ML-8712 pulse modulator power triodes are used. The maximum HT supply voltage to the amplifiers is 16kV and the cathode current at full power is 42 A. The triodes have a peak anode voltage of 45 kV and can withstand a peak current pulse of 175 A. The power amplifiers have well engineered control, crowbar, safety interlocking, water cooling and diagnostic systems. Indication of current status and operation is performed by a remote PLC (programmable logic controller) near the operator. An ignitron crowbar protects the triodes in the event of excessive cathode current.
584

Flgure 8.

Flat RF pulse.

400 kW

RF

pulse generators

mentation sometimes requires a large power at the beginning of the pulse for a short time, followed by a constant power of lower amplitude. Such a pulse is shown in figure 9. Although phase errors introduced by the amplifiers are negligible, the phase control is often required when matching to the plasma load. Figure 10 shows the two RF currents measured in the RMF coils of the new rotamak device which are of equal amplitude and 90" out of phase, as required. Preliminary experimentation indicates that the generators are tolerant to poorly matched loads.
Flgure 9.

Experimentally useful pulse.

Acknowledgments

This work was funded by the Australian Research Council, the Australian Institute for Nuclear Science and Engineering and the Flinders University research budget.

References

Hugrass W N, Jones I R and Phillips M G R 1980 A highpower RF line generator of novel design J . Phys. E: Sci. Instrum. 13 276 Jones I R 1979 The rotamak concept Flinders University Report FUPH-R-151 -1986 Current drive by means of ( j x B ) Comm. Plasma
Figure 10.

Dephasea load currents.

Phys. Controlled Fusion 10 I15

Stephan L G, Hugrass W N and Jones I R 1982 Two-sparkgap RF line generator with improved performance J.
Phys. E: Sci. Instrum. 15 992

535