TABLE OF CONTENTS This chapter describes the application and design of diode rectifier circuits. It covers single-phase rectifier circuits, threephase rectifier circuits, poly-phase rectifier circuits, and highfrequency rectifier circuits. The objectives of this chapter are:
To enable the readers to understand the operation of typical rectifier circuits.
To enable the readers to appreciate the different qualities of rectifiers required for different applications.
To enable the reader to design practical rectifier circuits.
The high-frequency rectifier waveforms given are obtained from PSPICE simulations, which take into account the secondary effects of stray and parasitic components. In this way, the waveforms can closely resemble the real ones. These waveforms are particularly useful to help designers determine the practical voltage, current, and other ratings of high-frequency rectifiers.
There are two types of single-phase diode rectifier that convert a single-phase ac supply into a dc voltage, namely, singlephase half-wave rectifiers and single-phase full-wave rectifiers. In the following subsections, the operations of these rectifier circuits are examined and their performances are analyzed and compared in a tabulated form. For the sake of simplicity, the diodes are considered to be ideal, i.e. they have zero forward voltage drop and reverse recovery time. This assumption is generally valid for the case of diode rectifiers which use the mains, a low-frequency source, as the input, and when the forward voltage drop is small compared...
