Three-way, three phase power divider and combiner

Details Three-way, three phase power divider and combiner Three-way, three phase power divider and combiner

2000-06-06

2001-10-30

Han, Jessica (Department: 2838)

Electric power conversion systems

Current conversion

With means to introduce or eliminate frequency components

C323S213000

Reexamination Certificate

active

06310788

ABSTRACT:

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a three-way, three-phase power divider or combiner. More specifically, the invention will split power into three equally powered signals with different phases of 0 degrees, 60 degrees and 120 degrees. The phases can also be 0 degrees,−60 degrees and−120 degrees. The invention will also combine three signals of equal power that are sixty degrees relative in phase into one signal.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
RF Power Dividers or Combiners make possible the generation of high levels of RF power using lower powered RF transistors. This facilitates the substitution of transistors in place of high-powered tubes, yielding more reliable designs.
By splitting the power into the three phases of 0, 60 and 120 degrees, rather than all three signals being in phase, a good front end VSWR match is produced, the third and fifth harmonic is suppressed, and a flat power gain response is produced over a broad bandwidth.
The power divider feeds into three individual power amplifiers, which increase the power to upwards of hundreds or thousands of watts. By splitting the signal into those three phases, three amplifiers when recombined with a 3-phase combiner can then be used to suppress the third and fifth harmonics. There is also good VSWR at the front end, and at the output, across a broad band of frequencies.
An object of the present invention is to provide a matched input port, independent of output port terminations. If all 3 of the divider output ports are terminated with identical loads of identical reflection coefficients (&rgr;), the input port will look like a perfect match. The output ports can either be 3 open-circuits, 3 short circuits, 3 pure imaginary loads, 3 pure real loads, or 3 complex loads. As long as they are identical in nature and on each of the output ports, then the input port will look like perfect match. If, for example, the divider was designed for a 50 Ohm system, then the input to the divider will look like 50 ohms, regardless of how the 3 output ports are terminated, as long as they are3 identical loads.
Another object of the present invention is to provide constant or improved efficiency into loads with adverse VSWRs. When an amplifier is driven into load VSWRs other that 50 ohms, its efficiency is reduced. A Zero-degree Combiner will not improve the efficiency. However, with a 3-Phase (60 degree)network, the efficiency may remain constant as the amplifiers will alternatively improve or degrade in efficiency, with the net result being constant.
A further object of the present invention is to suppress 3
rd
and 5
th
order harmonics. The phase relationships of the 3-Phase Combiner network helps suppress the 3
rd
and 5
th
order harmonics produced by the amplifiers that are being combined, yielding a better spectral response. A Zero-degree network will provide no suppression of harmonics.
Another object of the present invention is the reduction of reverse Inter-Modulation Distortion(IMD) products. When amplifiers are adjacently located, their output signals sometimes leak into each others output circuitry. If the signals are of slightly different frequencies, they will generate IMD products. The 3-Phase Combiner will suppress these products, while the zero-degree network offers no correction.


REFERENCES:
patent: 4665322 (1987-05-01), Eishima et al.
patent: 6088245 (2000-07-01), Ainsworth

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