Design of a 30 kV power supply for rapid capacitor charging

Abstract

This thesis describes the design and construction of a compact power supply designed to charge a 6.6 pF capacitor to 30 kV in 40 ms from a thermal battery. The thermal battery has an output of 500 Vdc which is stepped up to 30 kV DC through the use of a micro-controlled H-Bridge and a custom built step-up transformer. The H-Bridge is used to convert the DC into AC which the transformer steps up to 30 kV. A rectifier is then used to convert the AC output of the transformer into DC used to charge the 6.6 pF load capacitor. The load capacitor will eventually drive a pulsed microwave emitter.