Inverter simulation in Simulink - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Inverter simulation

📖 Scenario: You are working on a simple simulation of an electrical inverter. An inverter converts DC voltage to AC voltage by switching the output on and off in a pattern. We will simulate the inverter output over time using Python.

🎯 Goal: Build a Python program that simulates the inverter output voltage over a series of time steps. You will create the data, set a threshold, apply the switching logic, and then display the output voltage pattern.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a list of DC input voltages over 10 time steps

Create a threshold voltage variable

Use a list comprehension to simulate the inverter output voltage: output voltage is the DC voltage if above threshold, else zero

Print the inverter output voltage list

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Inverters are used in solar power systems and uninterruptible power supplies to convert DC to AC power.

💼 Career

Understanding inverter simulation helps in roles like electrical engineering, renewable energy system design, and embedded systems programming.

1

Create the DC input voltage list

Create a list called dc_voltages with these exact values: [0, 2, 5, 7, 10, 7, 5, 2, 0, 0] representing DC voltage at 10 time steps.

Simulink

# Create the dc_voltages list with the given values
# Your code here

Hint

Use square brackets to create a list and separate values with commas.

2

Set the threshold voltage

Create a variable called threshold and set it to 5. This will be the voltage level that decides if the inverter output is on or off.

Simulink

dc_voltages = [0, 2, 5, 7, 10, 7, 5, 2, 0, 0]
# Create the threshold variable and set it to 5
# Your code here

Hint

Use a simple assignment statement to create the threshold variable.

3

Simulate inverter output using list comprehension

Create a list called inverter_output using a list comprehension. For each voltage v in dc_voltages, output v if it is greater than or equal to threshold, otherwise output 0.

Simulink

dc_voltages = [0, 2, 5, 7, 10, 7, 5, 2, 0, 0]
threshold = 5
# Create inverter_output list using list comprehension
# Your code here

Hint

Use the syntax: [expression for item in list]. Use a conditional expression inside.

4

Display the inverter output voltage

Print the inverter_output list to show the simulated inverter voltage over time.

Simulink

dc_voltages = [0, 2, 5, 7, 10, 7, 5, 2, 0, 0]
threshold = 5
inverter_output = [v if v >= threshold else 0 for v in dc_voltages]
# Print the inverter_output list
# Your code here

Hint

Use the print() function to display the list.