42V electrical power systems are on their way to replacing the present l4V systems in automobiles and 42V/14V dual voltage systems have been proposed to provide backward compatibility with the existing components for the 14V systems. A synchronous buck/boost converter is an attractive topology for 42V/14V dual voltage systems since it offers the possibility of bi-directional operation without additional components. In this paper, transient currents generated during converter startup or changes in operation modes between buck and boost are analyzed and a cost effective solution to remove the transient currents is proposed. The validity of the proposed control strategy is investigated through simulation and experiment with bi-directional converters.