Difference between revisions of "Anchor"

Revision as of 01:34, 22 December 2010

Anchor will be an electronic current/voltage sink, for testing/characterizing power supplies and other similar tasks.

Desired features/specs:
- Constant current and constant voltage options
  - Maybe constant power too?
- Ramp-up/down automatically and track outputs
- Pulse load to test transient response
- 5A/100V maximums
  - 500W dissipation in a FET is a bit nuts, so it won't be 5A *at* 100V
  - 100W continuous, 500W pulse might be reasonable? Would be nice anyway.
- Some kind of computer interface for more complicated tests/more detailed data analysis
  - USB would be easy to implement
  - Ethernet could be cool, but that seems overkill here
  - GPIB would be the traditional choice for test gear, but I've never done any work with it
MCU needs:
- A few analog channels
  - 4 16-bit ADC channels (voltage, current, heatsink temperature, UI pot)
  - 1 PWM or DAC channel (input into op amp)
- A bunch of digital channels
  - 2 for a quadrature encoder for the UI
  - 1 for a CC/CV mode relay (if required)
  - 1 for a CC/CV mode switch?
  - 1 for a Load On switch
- ATxmega16A4 seems a good fit for the MCU.
An LCD would be cool to plot the response of load variations without a PC (transient response, current limits, etc.)
- Could use a simple STN monochrome panel, would be cheap and work well
- Could alternatively use a touchscreen OLED, would be expensive but look really cool
- Middle ground would be a touchscreen LCD, which would be not-crazy-expensive and still look pretty cool
- With any of these options, want the critical UI bits to be physical controls (current/voltage mode/setting)

@@ Line 21: / Line 21: @@
 *** 1 for a CC/CV mode relay (if required)
 *** 1 for a CC/CV mode switch?
+*** 1 for a Load On switch
 ** ATxmega16A4 seems a good fit for the MCU.
 * An LCD would be cool to plot the response of load variations without a PC (transient response, current limits, etc.)