Who would like to redesign the DC-AC power inverter with me? We'll split a cool $1M prize. https://www.littleboxchallenge.com/
Jeff
Jeff
Little Box Challenge
- Thread starter Jeffrey Knorr
- Start date
Re: Little Box Challenge
is the little box allowed to have a liquid nitrogen hookup?
Seems like an ambitious project to shoot for a 10x reduction in inverter size
Jason
is the little box allowed to have a liquid nitrogen hookup?
Seems like an ambitious project to shoot for a 10x reduction in inverter size
Jason
Re: Little Box Challenge
Using switch mode technology, it does not seem too difficult to achieve power densities in line with the challenge- there are amplifiers of 20-40 cubic inches that are doing it now.
Oh, the rules only allow 5 power connections (DC in, AC output & ground) so the liquid nitrogen hookup ain't gonna fly.
Looks like their reduction of 10x is based on "old school" inverters that used a lot of iron and copper.is the little box allowed to have a liquid nitrogen hookup?
Seems like an ambitious project to shoot for a 10x reduction in inverter size
Jason
Using switch mode technology, it does not seem too difficult to achieve power densities in line with the challenge- there are amplifiers of 20-40 cubic inches that are doing it now.
Oh, the rules only allow 5 power connections (DC in, AC output & ground) so the liquid nitrogen hookup ain't gonna fly.
Re: Little Box Challenge
Art,
This challenge is for a functional 10x improvement over the state of the art for 2014 switch mode systems. There's nothing simple about this. This is IEEEs stab at an X prize or DARPA type contest.
To get the thermal dissipation down people will almost assuredly have to move beyond indirect bandgap (i.e. silicon devices). Meet the challenge, Google's 1mil will just be the bonus money you hand out to the staff, as the orders will come hot and heavy.
Art,
This challenge is for a functional 10x improvement over the state of the art for 2014 switch mode systems. There's nothing simple about this. This is IEEEs stab at an X prize or DARPA type contest.
To get the thermal dissipation down people will almost assuredly have to move beyond indirect bandgap (i.e. silicon devices). Meet the challenge, Google's 1mil will just be the bonus money you hand out to the staff, as the orders will come hot and heavy.
Re: Little Box Challenge
Yep. This is an interesting engineering problem, where the salient issues are:
Must have a DC-AC efficiency of greater than 95%
Must maintain a temperature of no more than 60°C during operation everywhere on the outside of the device that can be touched.
Must conform to Electromagnetic Compliance standards as set out in FCC Part 15 B
Can not use any external source of cooling (e.g. water) other than air
Must be in a rectangular metal enclosure of no more than 40 cubic inches
Must be able to handle up to 2 kVA loads
Electrically, this type of inverter exists: commercially available grid scale inverters have efficiencies around 97%+. The issue is fitting the whole package into a 40 cubic inch enclosure and keeping it cool (remember, there's up to 100W of heat to dissipate here). Unless the device efficiencies can be kept above ~98%, I suspect that forced air cooling will end up being used, as dissipating 100W in a 40 cubic inch enclosure with less than a 30C rise above ambient temperature is rather nontrivial with free convection.
Yep. This is an interesting engineering problem, where the salient issues are:
Must have a DC-AC efficiency of greater than 95%
Must maintain a temperature of no more than 60°C during operation everywhere on the outside of the device that can be touched.
Must conform to Electromagnetic Compliance standards as set out in FCC Part 15 B
Can not use any external source of cooling (e.g. water) other than air
Must be in a rectangular metal enclosure of no more than 40 cubic inches
Must be able to handle up to 2 kVA loads
Electrically, this type of inverter exists: commercially available grid scale inverters have efficiencies around 97%+. The issue is fitting the whole package into a 40 cubic inch enclosure and keeping it cool (remember, there's up to 100W of heat to dissipate here). Unless the device efficiencies can be kept above ~98%, I suspect that forced air cooling will end up being used, as dissipating 100W in a 40 cubic inch enclosure with less than a 30C rise above ambient temperature is rather nontrivial with free convection.