IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MAGNETICS, VOL. 49, NO.

7, JULY 2013 4257

Equivalent Electrical Model of a Ferrite Core Inductor Excited by a Square

Waveform Including Saturation and Power Losses for Circuit Simulation
R. A. Salas and J. Pleite
Departamento de Tecnología Electrónica, Escuela Politécnica Superior, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, 28911 Leganés
(Madrid), Spain

We propose a model of an equivalent electrical circuit specifically designed for a ferrite inductor excited by a nonsinusoidal waveform
valid for use in an electronic circuit simulator. We estimate the model parameters by means of Finite Elements in 2-D which leads to
significant computational advantages over the 3-D model. We carry out the validation of the procedure for an RM14/I core by com-
paring the experimental and simulated output waveforms obtained at different frequencies and levels of excitation from the linear to the
saturation regions. In addition, we consider the effect of power losses in the core.
Index Terms—Ferrite inductors, 2-D finite element analysis, power losses, saturation.

I. INTRODUCTION propose a 2-D equivalent modeling procedure which achieves

convergence and gives results in a matter of seconds. The 2-D

F ERRITES are used in power converters because of their
low losses and their high permeability [1]–[4]. These
ferrites exhibit nonlinear behavior (saturation, hysteresis and
power losses) that needs to be taken into account in circuit
simulators in order to carry out a precise transient simulation of
these power converters [5]–[8]. Models and linear simulations
of these converters are found in the literature [9]–[13]. Never-
theless, there is a lack of power converter models capable of
reproducing the nonlinear behavior of their ferrite cores.
In this paper we present an electrical model of a ferrite in-
ductor specifically valid for nonsinusoidal waveforms. As an
example, we show the results for inductors with RM geometry
excited by square waveforms at different frequencies when the
core is saturated. In addition, we consider the effect of power
losses in the core. The inductor to be tested is shown in Fig. 1(a).
Rectangular modulus (RM) cores arose due to the demand for
coil formers with integrated pins that allow for efficient winding
and high PCB packing densities.
II. PROCEDURE TO CALCULATE THE WAVEFORMS
The objective is to obtain the inductance and resistance
values of the equivalent electrical circuit of an inductor and with
these values to derive the output voltage and current waveforms
for an input square excitation voltage. In this model, and
are connected in series and are nonlinear. depends on the exci-
tation current ( curve) and depends on the rms current
and frequency curve).
In order to estimate the model parameters and we pro-
pose modeling procedures based on the use of Finite Elements
in 2-D. In order to carry out the 2-D simulations we design a
2-D equivalent model to represent the real inductor. Due to the
relatively complex shapes of the inductors, the 3-D simulations
often do not converge or else take hours of computation, so we
Manuscript received November 04, 2012; accepted December 30, 2012. Date
of current version July 15, 2013. Corresponding author: R. A. Salas (e-mail:
rsalas@ing.uc3m.es).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TMAG.2013.2238223
modeling procedures to estimate and are different and in-
volve three steps: premodeling, simulation and postmodeling.
We estimate by means of 2-D simulations by applying a
variable DC current to the ferrite core. At the premodeling
step we use as input parameters for the simulation program the
curve that characterizes the core material and reproduces
the behavior of the material from the linear to the saturation re-
gions. In order to measure this curve we use a DC power supply
and an electronic fluxmeter. We obtain as output of the simula-
tion program the curve and at the postmodeling step we
compute the curve by differentiation as
(1)
where is the magnetic flux.
We carry out the simulations for the calculation of in 2-D
and in time domain. At the premodeling step we use as input
parameters to the simulation program the experimental
curve and the values of the Steinmetz coefficients [14] of the fer-
rite to be analyzed that reproduce the power losses in the core.
We measure these coefficients by applying a square excitation
voltage to the ferrite core at different frequencies and amplitudes
of the voltage from the linear to the saturation regions. We ob-
tain as outputs of the simulation program the voltage, current
and power waveforms and at the postmodeling step we derive
the curve by numerical integration as
(2)
where is the average value of the power waveform and
is the rms value of the current waveform. In this case we can ob-
tain a curve for each working frequency. We validate and
by comparing the computed results with those obtained experi-
mentally. The equivalent resistance of an inductor is usually de-
fined as the resistance for a sinusoidal signal instead of a square
wave signal, and a square wave is equivalent to a combination
of many sine waves. So the resistance discussed in this paper
is the average resistance for a square wave signal instead of the
real transient resistant for a sinusoidal AC signal.
We then develop a computer software based on Matlab,
Simulink and the circuit simulator PSIM, where we insert the

0018-9464 © 2013 IEEE

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 4258 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MAGNETICS, VOL. 49, NO. 7, JULY 2013

value of the power and the average value of the power per unit
volume of the core. We compute as

(5)

where is the time period of the waveform. We then compute

using (2).
Fig. 1. (a) Real inductor with an RM14/I core. (b) Triangular mesh generated
by the 2-D simulations.
In order to obtain the values of the Steinmetz coefficients
we fit the experimental data to the Steinmetz
equation [14]
values of the and curves. We obtain the voltage
(6)
and current waveforms from PSIM and from these data derive
the power waveform. Finally, we compare the results with
In this equation is the maximum value of the magnetic field
experimental measurements.
defined as

III. METHODS (7)

A. Experimental Measurements
where is the number of turns of the inductor to be studied.
We took two different types of measurements to analyze the
nonlinear behavior of the ferrite cores, to obtain the input param- B. 2-D Domain Design
eters of the 2-D FEA simulations and to validate the proposed
In order to carry out the 2-D simulations we have designed a
procedure and simulations by comparison with the experimental
2-D domain equivalent to the real geometry. This computational
results.
domain was designed so that the magnetic fields and the volume
1) Measurements Under DC Current: The objective of these
are the same as the real geometry. In Fig. 1(b) we see the 2-D
measurements is to obtain the magnetic properties of the core
computational domain for the RM ferrite core and in [15] we
( curve) and the curve of the inductor.
give more details about its design.
In order to obtain the curve, we built a two-winding
toroidal transformer with the same material as the studied ferrite C. Meshing Conditions
and we measure the curve for current values from 0 to core
saturation. We have chosen a toroidal geometry as it eliminates In order to carry out the 2-D simulations we have chosen
the effect of the air-gap and the magnetic field lines tend to be an adaptative procedure. In each iteration the program com-
circular, thus reducing the edge effect. We compute the and putes the magnetic fields, makes an error estimate and refines
values using Matlab as: the mesh. This adaptative meshing reduces the computing time
and the convergence and tolerance.
(3)
IV. VALIDATION AND EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS
(4) We have applied our procedure to an inductor with an RM
ferrite core consisting of two identical halves of RM14/I, a coil
where and are the number of turns of the primary and former and 10 turns of copper coil. In Fig. 1(a) we show the
secondary winding respectively, is the effective area of the built inductor. In order to verify the model, we excite the tested
ferrite core and is the effective length of the ferrite. inductor with a square waveform at frequencies of 40 and 100
In order to obtain the curve of the inductor, we built a kHz, provided by a DC-DC buck power converter we built, ca-
two-winding transformer with the same core as the one studied pable of supplying the ranges of voltage, current and frequency
and we measure the curve for current values from 0 up to needed to reach saturation of the core. In Fig. 2 we show the
core saturation. From this, we derive the curve using (1). buck DC-DC power converter and in Fig. 3 its diagram in-
2) Measurements Under Variable Voltage and Frequency: cluding the electrical inductor model. In order to take the ex-
The objectives of these measurements are to obtain the Stein- perimental measurements necessary to validate the curve
metz coefficients, to validate the output voltage and the current computed by the 2-D FEA simulations, another identical copper
waveforms obtained from the proposed procedure to estimate coil was wound around the first one to build a transformer.
as well as validating the output voltage and current waveforms We carry out the 2-D simulations using the Ansoft Maxwell
from the circuit simulator. field simulator’s rz magnetostatic solver to compute the
For all of this, we measure the voltage and current curve and the transient solver to compute the
waveforms by exciting the inductor with a square waveform in curve. In Fig. 1(b) we show the corresponding 2-D equiv-
order to obtain the curve from which we derive the alent design made for the 2-D FEA simulations. We chose
curve and the curve from which we derive (unit are millimeters) as a com-
the Steinmetz coefficients. and are respectively the average putational domain and % as a fixed percent error. For the
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 SALAS AND PLEITE: EQUIVALENT ELECTRICAL MODEL OF A FERRITE CORE INDUCTOR EXCITED BY A SQUARE WAVEFORM 4259

Fig. 5. curves at 100 kHz.

Fig. 2. Real DC-DC power converter.

Fig. 3. Diagram of the buck DC-DC converter used. F,

(IRF530A Mosfet transistor), D (BYW29F Ultrafast rectifier
diode). is the DC input voltage and is the DC output voltage.

Fig. 6. Experimental (dotted line) and simulated (solid line) waveforms at 40

kHz. V. . . (a)
Voltage. (b) Current. (c) Power.

Fig. 4. curves.

simulations at 40 kHz we take the computed values of the Stein-

metz coefficients as and for 100
kHz we take we take these values as
We have carried out the validation of the procedure based on the
and curves computed by 2-D FEA simulations
and the waveforms obtained by the circuit simulator PSIM,
comparing for each case the experimental and simulated results.
In Fig. 4 we plot both curves showing good agreement
between the results. The curve reaches a maximum
and tends to a very small final value with increasing . Fig. 5
shows the resistance curves at 100 kHz where we see that the
resistance increases when the current increases. This is due
to the fact that an increase of the voltage leads to an increase
of the current through the inductor, as well as the power losses
in the core. In Figs. 6 and 7, we show the experimental and
simulated voltage, current and power waveforms at 40 kHz
and 100 kHz as an example of a saturated core, repectively. In
figure caption we show both the value of the duty cycle and the
values of the Steinmetz coefficients used for the simulations.
As can be seen, there is good agreement between the results.
The saturation effect is included in the model as the current
waveform is curved. This curve would not exist if the model
were linear (the inductor current waveform has a triangular
shape).
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.
Fig. 7. Experimental (dotted line) and simulated (solid line) waveforms at 100
kHz. V. . . (a)
Voltage. (b) Current. (c) Power.
There is good agreement between the experimental and com-
puted resistance values.
In order to verify that the effect of power losses is reproduced
in our model we compute the average power in a cycle, defined
as (5). In Table I we show the experimental and simulated
power values computed at 40 kHz and 100 kHz and for
different input voltage of the converter . As we can see,
our model is capable of reproducing the effect of power losses.
The powers , although small, increase with frequency and
to a lesser extent with as typically observed experimentally.
This is due to the fact that an increase of the voltage leads to
 4260
TABLE I
EXPERIMENTAL AND COMPUTED AVERAGE POWERS
an increase of the current through the inductor. As a conse-
quence, both and increase, as well as the size of the gen-
erated hysteresis loop and the power losses in the core. When
we do not consider power losses in the core, the value of the av-
erage power is zero as theoretically expected. Eddy cur-
rent losses are usually not a significant portion of the overall
core loss. The MnZn ferrite core studied in this paper has high
resistivity ( m at 100 kHz, m at 1 MHz), and
therefore it has low eddy current losses.
V. CONCLUSION
In this paper we have proposed a model of an equivalent elec-
trical circuit specifically designed for inductors with soft ferrite
cores suitable for use in a circuit simulator and nonsinusoidal
waveforms. We have developed a computer software based
on PSIM, Matlab and Simulink where we have implemented
the equivalent electrical circuit of the inductor consisting of
and in series considering two cases: with and without power
losses in the core. For this, we have entered the nonlinear curves
of and , computed by 2-D Finite Element Analysis. This
software allows us to get the output voltage and current wave-
forms of the inductor. To verify the model with a nonsinusoidal
waveform we have included a 10-turn RM14/I ferrite inductor
in a buck DC-DC power converter and we have compared
the resulting voltage, current and power waveforms with the
equivalent experimental waveforms. We have also compared
the simulated and experimental results of and . As we
have been able to verify, our model reproduces the effects of
saturation and power losses, showing good agreement between
the experimental and computed results. We have studied the
cases of 40 kHz and 100 kHz and have observed that the power
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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MAGNETICS, VOL. 49, NO. 7, JULY 2013
increases with the DC input voltage of the converter and the
voltage and current waveforms follow the same tendency as the
experimetal results. The power losses, although small, increase
when the frequency increases.
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