Ansys Maxwell Forward Converter
 

Hello. I'm currently doing the design of a power transformer for a Forward converter. My transformer is designed with Hurley and Wolffle's method in mind, which aims to minimize the total losses as much as possible. This is achieved by operating at an optimum value of flux density that is less than the saturation value, when the core and winding losses are the same. (see image bellow)

http://i1302.photobucket.com/albums/...ps3g8b7rxr.png

So far I've achieved a fairly accurate design (Pcu is very close to Pfe). However, it's been taking me a lot of time and effort on ANSYS Maxwell to get a satisfactory result for the winding losses, which are way bellow the predicted value. I'm almost certain that it's an issue related to the electrical resistance of the windings calculated by the solver that is causing this, since I've associated the correct parameters to the materials and am getting accurate results for the output voltage, induced voltages, winding currents and core loss. At first I thought the issue was stemming from the physical geometry of the transformer, which is associating a wrong value of electrical resistance to the windings, but despite redrawing the windings the issue still persists. The windings are set as external and stranded and as such it isn't possible to edit their resistance values. Any suggestions? Thanks in advance.

Designed values:
http://i1302.photobucket.com/albums/...psuwviucmn.png