Self-Powered Supply and Control System for Hybrid Semiconductor DC Switch

This paper provides details regarding the design of a self-powered supply used with a hybrid DC switch, and its control system. The power supply was configured to accept the voltage over the contacts of the DC switch as its source and deliver a stable 5 V output rail. This output voltage was used to power a microcontroller which generated a sequence of control pulses for thyristors used in the hybrid switch. These thyristors were used to charge and discharge a resonant circuit which ultimately provided a counter current capable of extinguishing an arc which occurred over the contacts of the DC switch when interrupting DC current. QC 20181130