60-70v unregulated power supply recommendations

[Neale]

John - for the reasons you suggest (load regulation/mains variation), I went with a 2x45V transformer with the secondaries wired in parallel. I used a 625VA Vigortronics toroidal from Rapid Online. You could get the other components from Rapid as well and maybe get free postage. I'm using EM806 drives that are good for max of 80V and nothing's gone pop yet!

Judy a thought.

[JoeHarris]

John - for the reasons you suggest (load regulation/mains variation), I went with a 2x45V transformer with the secondaries wired in parallel. I used a 625VA Vigortronics toroidal from Rapid Online. You could get the other components from Rapid as well and maybe get free postage. I'm using EM806 drives that are good for max of 80V and nothing's gone pop yet!

Judy a thought.

2x45v? woocha!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[john swift]

Hi Neale

The other variable is when an axis decelerates and the motors becomes generators returning energy back to the power supply capacitors

the voltage at power supply terminals could be increased beyond the drivers limit
if the decelerating axis returns a lot more energy than other axis use and the power supply capacitors can absorb

John

PS
Hi Joe
the great thing with the 625VA transformers with Bifilar wound 45V secondaries is they can be connected in parallel to give you 45V at 13.88A
you just get the phasing of the winding correct !!!

[Agathon]

Hi Neale

The other variable is when an axis decelerates and the motors becomes generators returning energy back to the power supply capacitors

the voltage at power supply terminals could be increased beyond the drivers limit

John

Plenty to think about here for the electronically semi-literate like myself. I think keeping the voltage around 70v seems sensible. Is there any disadvantage to using a transformer with a pair of 45v secondaries in parallel? Conversely, any advantage to using a 24v in series?

Rapid Electronics seems like a good place to buy. Is there anything I need to look out for when buying capacitors? I believe there are differences in quality from one manufacturer to another - I don't want to spoil the ship for a ha'porth of tar.

[john swift]

Hi Agathon

in power supplies its worth checking the ripple current rating of your capacitors is OK for your circuit
and if available buy 105°C high temperature capacitors that can run hotter than the 85°C standard electrolytic capacitor

John

for ripple current
http://www.skillbank.co.uk/psu/ripple.htm

[Neale]

One reason I went with 2x45V in parallel rather than 2x24V or 2x25V in series is that it gives a few volts headroom. As has been said already, these transformers are specifically wound in a way that allows parallel connection safely but you shouldn't parallel-connect arbitrary transformer windings. Phasing is important; get it wrong with series-connection and you get zero output but get it wrong with parallel-connection and you are going to have a very hot transformer very quickly (before the fuse blows...) I'm using 625VA, but from some power measurements I have done on my machine, I reckon that 500VA is plenty. However, the bigger transformer was only a few quid more and it fitted the space available, so I went with the over-specced option. If I were building these things commercially, I would go 500VA or maybe a touch less and still be confident that I was going to run within ratings. I have a habit of over-building my own kit...

This link gives some results I measured on my own power supply. Yes, there is still a lot of mains frequency ripple on the DC side but the stepper drivers are very voltage-variation-tolerant. After all, they are typically specced to run between 24-80V absolute max, something like 28-70V in practice. While it is true that there will be some back EMF when the motor is decelerating, I didn't see any obvious evidence of large spikes on the oscilloscope amongst the general high-frequency switching noise (although I accept that this kind of thing will be difficult to see) but you have to remember that there are the smoothing capacitors that are going to take the sting out of these voltage spikes.

Overall, and even though I'm not the kind of guy who generally accepts blind "do this and you'll be OK" kind of advice without a bit more analysis, the answer is that everyone who has used 2x24 or2x45 transformers with 3x4700uF or 2x6800uF capacitors with the AM882/EM806 class drivers has been very happy with the results and you are unlikely to do better than this.

[Agathon]

One reason I went with 2x45V in parallel rather than 2x24V or 2x25V in series is that it gives a few volts headroom. As has been said already, these transformers are specifically wound in a way that allows parallel connection safely but you shouldn't parallel-connect arbitrary transformer windings. Phasing is important; get it wrong with series-connection and you get zero output but get it wrong with parallel-connection and you are going to have a very hot transformer very quickly (before the fuse blows...) I'm using 625VA, but from some power measurements I have done on my machine, I reckon that 500VA is plenty. However, the bigger transformer was only a few quid more and it fitted the space available, so I went with the over-specced option. If I were building these things commercially, I would go 500VA or maybe a touch less and still be confident that I was going to run within ratings. I have a habit of over-building my own kit...

This link gives some results I measured on my own power supply. Yes, there is still a lot of mains frequency ripple on the DC side but the stepper drivers are very voltage-variation-tolerant. After all, they are typically specced to run between 24-80V absolute max, something like 28-70V in practice. While it is true that there will be some back EMF when the motor is decelerating, I didn't see any obvious evidence of large spikes on the oscilloscope amongst the general high-frequency switching noise (although I accept that this kind of thing will be difficult to see) but you have to remember that there are the smoothing capacitors that are going to take the sting out of these voltage spikes.

Overall, and even though I'm not the kind of guy who generally accepts blind "do this and you'll be OK" kind of advice without a bit more analysis, the answer is that everyone who has used 2x24 or2x45 transformers with 3x4700uF or 2x6800uF capacitors with the AM882/EM806 class drivers has been very happy with the results and you are unlikely to do better than this.

Many thanks Neale. I'm interested in a great deal of things and am a dedicated life-long learner. However, with some things I just want to grasp the basics, do as instructed and get on with it so this is all very good advice. I am fortunate in have a very competent electronic engineer friend who can always be called upon for advice if I'm a bit unsure about how to proceed.

Best regards

David

[Agathon]

I just want to check that the symptoms I'm getting with my set-up is down to an inadequate power supply. Here they are:

• Losing steps on rapid travel
• Drives trip "sensorless stall detection"
• I also get an occasional message from Mach3 saying something like "one or more of the drives exceeded the 25000 kernal setting".

I've got the current settings at maximum.