American Superconductor: ‘More power’ to developer kits

Developer kits are popular and useful tools for implementing board-level, microprocessor, and similar kinds of products.

By Control Engineering Staff January 27, 2005

Developer kits are popular and useful tools for implementing board-level, microprocessor, and similar kinds of products. However, such kits usually cater to low-power levels. A recent announcement from American Superconductor Corp . (AMSC) raises the “power ante” dramatically, giving designers a means to quickly develop hardware and software elements of power conversion systems ranging from 60-225 kW for a wide range of applications—including motor drives. PowerModule PM1000 Developers Kit (PDK) accommodates ac-dc, dc-dc, and dc-ac types of power conversion.

The PDK is an engineering and design kit said to free OEMs, VARs, system integrators, and end-users from many complex but essential tasks associated with power conversion. Kits are available for 480 and 690 V ac inputs, and contain all tools needed to configure American Superconductor’s PM1000 power converter with the application or product under development.

Power conversion is a vital factor in designing products for many applications. Example include motor drives (ship propulsion, industrial automation, transportation, etc.); distributed generation (fuel cells, wind turbines, and photovoltaics); and distributed power networks (standard and uninterruptible power supplies, and flywheel-backup systems).

“This developers kit really helps people whose core competency is directed at the system level and not power conversion,” says Perry Schugart, director of sales and marketing, Power Electronics Systems at AMSC. “A developers kit is a way to avoid investing dollars or human resources in that area of design and development.”

AMSC is a leading supplier of reactive power grid stabilization products and is a principal vendor of high-temperature superconductor (HTS) wire and large rotating superconductor machinery. For more information on the developer kit, see December 2004 System Integration E-Newsletter , and for AMSC’s power converters, click here .

—Frank J. Bartos, executive editor, Control Engineering, fbartos@reedbusiness.com