Analysis of Thermal Behavior of High Frequency Transformers Using Finite Element Method

Abstract

High frequency transformer is used in many applications among the Switch Mode Power Supply (SMPS), high voltage pulse power and etc can be mentioned. Regarding that the core of these transformers is often the ferrite core; their functions partly depend on this core characteristic. One of the characteristics of the ferrite core is thermal behavior that should be paid attention to because it affects the transformer function and causes heat generation. In this paper, a typical high frequency transformer with ferrite core is designed and simulated in ANSYS software. Temperature rise due to winding current (Joule-heat) is considered as heat generation source for thermal behavior analysis of the transformer. In this simulation, the temperature rise and heat distribution are studied and the effects of parameters such as flux density, winding loss value, using a fan to cool the winding and core and thermal conductivity are investigated.