System-wide temperature estimation for IMS based power electronics circuits

An observer-based thermal modelling technique suitable for computation on embedded microprocessors to provide system wide prediction and projection of thermal state of function for a minimum increase in part count is proposed. High accuracy 3D finite element simulation is employed to calibrate a low complexity lumped parameter model from which a Luenberger observer is derived. Only a single temperature measurement from the system is required to close the Luenberger loop providing system temperature at critical locations. Whilst this approach is applicable to many power electronic systems, to give the paper focus, a practical AC-DC converter is considered and used to experimentally demonstrate the accuracy of the technique.