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Engineering Commons

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Electrical and Computer Engineering

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

2008

Sensors

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Full-Text Articles in Engineering

Work In Progress -- Instrumentation On A Truss Adapted For Pre-College Outreach, Amy K. Perrey, Steve Eugene Watkins, Ralph E. Flori, Theresa M. Swift Oct 2008

Work In Progress -- Instrumentation On A Truss Adapted For Pre-College Outreach, Amy K. Perrey, Steve Eugene Watkins, Ralph E. Flori, Theresa M. Swift

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Engineering content is a valuable addition to pre-college instruction in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) since it applies scientific concepts, illustrates scientific relevance and technology, and provides measurement opportunities. Also, complex systems and interactions can be shown. This work describes outreach resources using a seven-member instrumented truss apparatus. This aluminum bench-top model is scaled to support up to fifty pounds. Electrical resistance gauges are installed on several members for strain measurement. The resource set includes the truss apparatus, instrumentation, a PowerPoint presentation, and a background document. The pre-college objective is a set of demonstration resources for middle or high …


A Current-Sensorless Digital Controller For Active Power Factor Correction Control Based On Kalman Filters, Jonathan W. Kimball, Philip T. Krein Feb 2008

A Current-Sensorless Digital Controller For Active Power Factor Correction Control Based On Kalman Filters, Jonathan W. Kimball, Philip T. Krein

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

For low-power AC-DC converters, power factor correction (PFC) can be accomplished simply with certain converters operating in discontinuous conduction mode (DCM). At higher power levels, DCM results in higher losses, so most PFC converters use current feedback to actively track the correct current waveshape. This work presents a way to provide PFC control without the current sensor, by replacing the sensor with a Kalman filter, which is essentially a stochastic observer. Experimental results verify its high power factor and low total harmonic distortion (THD).