At AMPERE laboratory this board is used as the interface between the dSPACE (microcontroller) and the gate drivers of the IGBTs (switches), the board has as an input power (15V and GND) and also digital input which is coming from the dSPACE digital I/O port, dSPACE can handle up to 32 signals so there is 32 channels that recreates the same operation: first the signal goes through an opto-isolator (TLP521-1) to protect the expensive microcontroller. The next step is to create the complementary of the signal thanks to a NOR gate (HEF4001B), the signal and its complementary end in two of the 5 pins of the white male header at the bottom, another 2 pins are used for power (+15V) and ground (0V) the last pin is left empty. All these signals are used as the input for the gate driver.

A simplified block diagram for this board looks like the following:

This project is the third version of the dSPACE interface board in AMPERE laboratory, and one of my first PCB designs, my first challenge came as the previous version used ICs with sockets, these components are really big, and I had to find equivalents in SMD. Using new components implies creating new footprints and re-sizing the complete board which put me in a really bad position with the deadline, once the board was ready for printing my professor decided to include a small power and signal circuit with a led indicator which made necessary a re-organization in the board in the last moment. At that time, I did not have anyone else to cross check my circuit, when the first set of boards came, I finish assembling one of them and there where a mistake with one of the tracks which made necessary a second iteration of the board. All in all, the assembly and soldering of the second iteration of the board went well and I was right on time to meet with the proposed deadline.