Conceptual design and system studies for a 600 kW repetitive pulse transformer

Pulse transformer conceptual design and system studies were conducted at the Westinghouse Science and Technology Center for Sandia National Laboratories Repetitive High Energy Pulsed Power (RHEPP) System. The RHEPP system relies on magnetic switches to achieve pulse compression from 120 Hz AC to microsecond pulses. A 600 kW, 120 Hz Westinghouse alternator supplies AC prime power at 10 kV (rms). Two magnetic switching stages compress the pulses to 115 /spl mu/s prior to the pulse transformer. The transformer seps the voltage up to 254 kV. The pulse transformer has 18:1 turns ratio and is capable of continuous duty operation. System studies were conducted to minimize transformer loss and leakage inductance within transformer size constraints. The optimized design has a 3-step nickel iron core with 9 primary turns.