DIY Sinusoidal Power Inverter with Arduino

You’re likely familiar with pulse-width modulation, commonly known as PWM. In this scenario, an Arduino or other microcontroller board puts out a signal for short repeating amounts of time, which can substitute for an analog output in many cases. This project by Electronoobs, however, introduces a new related concept called SPWM — or sinusoidal pulse width modulation — then applies it to create a power inverter.

In this setup, sinusoidally varying pulse width values are produced by an Arduino board, which produces one side of an AC signal. A second signal is then added that outputs the same wave that starts when the positive signal turns off. When both are applied via MOSFETs to a transformer and capacitor, it’s able to produce a good approximation of household AC. From there, Electronoobs shows how to add feedback to the design using a rectifier circuit, allowing it to adjust as needed as the load on the circuit changes.

While an interesting experiment, dealing with high voltages is inherently dangerous, and there are inverters on the market that you can simply buy. So while the video introduces a few interesting new concepts, you may want to think twice before trying to duplicate this experiment yourself.