Power supply standardization and optimization study

A comprehensive design study of a power supply for use in the space shuttle and other space flight applications is presented. The design specifications are established for a power supply capable of supplying over 90 percent of the anticipated voltage requirements for future spacecraft avionics systems. Analyses and tradeoff studies were performed on several alternative design approaches to assure that the selected design would provide near optimum performance of the planned applications. The selected design uses a dc-to-dc converter incorporating regenerative current feedback with a time-ratio controlled duty cycle to achieve high efficiency over a wide variation in input voltage and output loads. The packaging concept uses an expandable mainframe capable of accommodating up to six inverter/regulator modules with one common input filter module.