An 8-Level Flying Capacitor Multi-Level Boost Converter for High-Voltage Power Distribution in Electric Aircraft
Abstract
Aviation is a rapidly growing transportation sector that has been seeing a shift towards more-electric and fully electric propulsion systems. Lightweight onboard DC-DC converters play a critical role in this transition by managing the varying DC voltages associated with battery charge and discharge, enabling the integration of diverse battery technologies onto a common DC bus, reducing high-voltage insulation mass by allowing lower battery voltages, and embedding fault protection directly within the converters. To support these applications, this work demonstrates an 8-level flying capacitor multilevel (FCML) converter designed and tested to boost an input battery voltage of 500-786 V to a 1000 V DC bus. The demonstrated system integrates embedded control, sensing, startup, and output disconnect. It achieves over 99.0% peak efficiency, as well as a gravimetric power density exceeding 100 kW/kg for the power stage.
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