Size reduction of air-borne transformers

SIZE and weight are very important design factors for air-borne electronic equipment. The cost of adding a pound of weight to the electronic equipment is $400 per airplane or more.1 One very effective way to reduce electronic equipment weight is to reduce the weight of the power transformers. Much progress has been made in this direction since World War II. In 1950 17 pounds were saved in one radar set by redesigning the transformers to use improved oriented steel cores. This represented a saving of 40% of the transformer weight of this equipment. Greater savings of space and weight than this are still possible through improved transformer design.