Patent ID: 11870340
Assignee: VICOR CORPORATION
Field: Electrical machinery, apparatus, energy (Electrical engineering)
Classification: CPC H | IPC H

Claim 17:
18. An apparatus comprising:
a power converter having a multi-layer printed circuit board (“PCB”) including a first conductive layer, a second conductive layer, and an insulation layer separating the first and second conductive layers;
a magnetically permeable E-core structure including a number, Np, of magnetic paths, each passing through the first and second conductive layers in at least two leg locations, the magnetic paths being arranged in a first set and a second set, each set forming a winding tunnel through the magnetic paths between the respective leg locations, the first set forming a first winding tunnel and the second set forming a second winding tunnel generally parallel to the first winding tunnel;
a first conductive winding including a first winding element passing through the first winding tunnel through the first set of magnetic paths in a first direction and through the second winding tunnel through the second set of magnetic paths in a direction opposite the first direction, the first conductive winding element being formed in the first conductive layer of the PCB;
a plurality of second winding elements, each passing through a respective subset of the magnetic paths between the respective leg locations, each subset including a number, Ns, of the magnetic paths, the second winding elements being formed in the second conductive layer;
a plurality of interconnected converter output cell elements each including a switch and a capacitor, in which each converter output cell element is associated with and includes at least a portion of a respective second winding element;
wherein the respective second winding element associated with each cell element has a first end connected to a terminal of the switch in the cell element and a second end connected to an output terminal in a neighboring cell element and the second winding elements in neighboring cell elements step through the respective subsets of magnetic paths in the same direction.