The Fault Analysis and Performance Improvement of Pulse Reactors

In capacitor energy storage pulsed power supplies, it is common to use a pulse inductor to adjust the discharge current waveform. To avoid magnetic saturation, hollow copper windings are typically employed for the pulse inductor. In this study, we utilized copper foil as the base material and adopted an epoxy casting method to manufacture an 80 μH pulse inductor. However, during experimentation, when the test current amplitude reached 45 kA, the pulse inductor suffered severe damage with the electrodes and epoxy core being detached, and the detachment area was heavily burnt. Through analysis, it was determined that the main causes of these issues were the inadequate design of the copper windings and electrode structure, as well as insufficient strength in the epoxy casting structure. To address these problems, we improved the epoxy core, copper windings and electrode structure, and fabricated an improved inductor by using epoxy glass around the copper windings. The improved inductor performed well without any abnormal occurrences under a pulsed current of 51 kA. This development process holds practical value for the research on pulsed power supplies.