DISCHARGE CIRCUIT FOR THE BATTERY OF THE INTERMEDIATE CIRCUIT OF A CONVERTER WITH AN INTERMEDIATE CIRCUIT

The invention relates to a discharge circuit (12) for an intermediate circuit battery (6) of an intermediate circuit converter (2), having a discharge resistor and a switching element. According to the invention, two thyristors (T1, T2), connected electrically in series, are provided as the switching element, the anode of the one thyristor (T1) being electrically conductively linked via a discharge resistor (14) to the positive terminal (22) and the cathode of the other thyristor (T2) being electrically conductively linked via a discharge resistor (16) to the negative terminal (24) of the intermediate circuit battery (6), a centre point (20) of the series circuit of the thyristors (T1, T2) is electrically conductively connected to one phase (L1) of the mains and the thyristors (T1, T2) are triggered simultaneously by means of control signals from a control circuit (18), as a function of the intermediate circuit voltage (Ud). In this way, a mains-commutated discharge circuit (12) is produced for an intermediate circuit battery (6) whose layout is cost-effective.