A Unity-Power-Factor IPT Pickup for High-Power Applications

This paper describes the design of a new unity-power-factor inductive-power-transfer (IPT) pickup using an LCL tuned network for application in high-power systems. This new topology has the potential to increase the efficiency and reduce the cost of high-power pickups by minimizing the reactive currents in the pickup coil and the reflected VAR loading on the power supply. In a practical system, the rectifier and associated processing circuitry distorts the current waveforms, adding an effective inductive loading to the pickup circuit. A series compensation capacitor is added to correct this loading. A design strategy is developed for the new topology, and two example circuits are constructed and compared experimentally with a traditional parallel-tuned (LC) pickup operating on a monorail-based IPT system.