This is it !

[gmeast]

Driver Board

Hey everyone,

I built a prototype MOSFET driver board for poly-phase testing. Below is a picture of it. The board has three discrete MOSFET driver circuits with return diode, UCC27322 gate driver, signal input cable, IRF540Z HEXFET, Toroid phase winding output cable, GND hookup, B+ hookup. The small light red cables are the 3 phase control cables from the poly-phase controller. The 3 8pin IC's are the gate driver chips, the three shorter white wires are the Toroid phase winding hookup cables, the long white wire is the 'commoned' return cable for all 3 return diodes, the large red wire is B+ and the large black wire is GND and the small black wire is the common Enable/Inhibit signal cable hooked to all three gate driver IC's ..... whew! A rather good size Cap has yet to be added. The Cap is necessary to meet the capacaitve 'pumping' current required for high speed MOSFET switching. It needs to be close to the FETS it is intended to service. The pictures are here:

http://02d1852.netsolhost.com/radian...oard_front.JPG

Later

[gmeast]

3-Phase MOSFET board

Hi whoever,

Here's a picture of the MOSFET board with the 0.1uF caps on it. It's been powered and seems to be 'good-to-go'. Here:

http://02d1852.netsolhost.com/radian..._FET_board.JPG

Presently I'm just trying to get some last minute questions answered about choke 'wrap' direction and coil 'firing order' remembering that this is NOT a Hydrogen Cell setup.

I'll post more when there's something worth posting ... like the thing generates 'dimensional jumps' or something.

Later

[7imix]

Beautiful!

[gmeast]

close

Beautiful!

Thanks,

I'm getting very close to the start of low power testing. I'll begin at 1KHz, 1usec PW and 120deg phase angle (symmetrical) as soon as I get some questions answered about the chokes in the system, specifically the directions of wrap and the 'firing order' (direction of swirl):
1) B+ choke ... 45 mix stranded wire ... CC or CW?
2) Diode return choke ... 52 mix silver plated solid copper ... CC or CW
3) The direction of 'swirl' based on CC & CW wrap directions for Northern/Southern hemispheres, 'right-hand-rule' and other considerations.

So, until I'm clear on these issues, I will refrain from running anything.

Later

[gmeast]

chokes

Hi all (that are actually following),

I am still waiting to hear 'from the horse's mouth' the correct configuration for the chokes. My concern is the direction of the turns. So, I decided to build one of each for the two core 'mixes'.

I made a CC and a CCW choke from two T157-45 cores and a CC and a CCW choke from two T157-52 cores. The -52 cores use 16ga. Teflon coated, silver-plated, solid copper wire and the -45 cores use 16ga. stranded wire. The chokes each have a full compliment, single layer wrap.

Boy ... the stranded wire is very hard to wrap tightly! Anyway, when I get the word, I'll just plug in the right ones. I want to refrain from blindly experimenting with this part of it since I'm not sure how to distinguish the characteristics of a CC-wrapped vs a CCW-wrapped choke in an arrangement like this.

There's a picture of them below showing the two -52's on the left and the two -45's on the right:

http://02d1852.netsolhost.com/radian...CC_and_CCW.JPG

Later

[Farmhand]

Nice Choke's

Hi Greg, They look good, very nice. It would be good to get a word on the direction of the wraps, it's a bit confusing to me, be carefull all those choke's don't take your breath away, Can't wait to see or hear your first preliminary results.

I'm trying to catch up, still no flow of parts yet, i'm working on it though.
Nice work, now i'm jealous because you had wire left over, I don't have enough left over to make choke's. Darn it.

Cheers

[gmeast]

wire

Hi Greg, They look good, very nice. It would be good to get a word on the direction of the wraps, it's a bit confusing to me, be carefull all those choke's don't take your breath away, Can't wait to see or hear your first preliminary results.

I'm trying to catch up, still no flow of parts yet, i'm working on it though.
Nice work, now i'm jealous because you had wire left over, I don't have enough left over to make choke's. Darn it.

Cheers

Hi Farmhand,

I can't explain it ... it's like "loaves and fishes" ... and I still have allot left. I guess I should be grateful they screwed me and gave me wire with 'fat' insulation. Next time I won't complain (so openly). So thanks HG ... I think. And I even still have one T157-52, two T130-52's and one T130-45 cores. I never had to pay for any of those cores ... and I'm still trying to figure out 'exactly' how I ended up with 8 Micrometals cores??? Me no complain 'bout nothin' no more.

Got some (paying) work tomorrow, so Friday I'll be making up (I think) three cable harnesses ... one for the 3-Phase signals from the PPC to the FET Board, one for common B+/choke, B+/Toroid, B+/recovery, B+/PPC supply and one for GND/PPC supply, GND/FET Board. I'll keep posting anything newsworthy ... here and private.

I did one more power-up test today. I powered the FET Board AND hooked the recovery diode (common) bus to B+ and no "phssst" ... OK!

Later

[gmeast]

progress

Hi all,

OK ... I now have a fully operational 3-Phase system like that which opened this thread. The difference is that I am using my own 'dedicated' on-the-fly-adjustable Poly Phase Controller (PPC) instead of Bob Boyce's Hex Controller, which is based around a micro processor and proprietary software.

My PPC is still in the 'breadboard' stage. That does not mean I'm still developing it. It just means I haven't had the cash to take it to the PCB stage yet. But the extra time has been well spent in that I have been able to gain some experience with the FETs and Driver Chips.

I have spent much time with the FET Board which is a stand-alone power component that only receives power from a battery and driver signals from the PPC (powered by the same battery). I have had some unfortunate experiences with the FETs and Driver ICs pivoting around my own experience with HF Power components. In a nutshell, I have found a way to fry every FET and Driver IC only because I have been trying to add safeguards to automatically shut down the FETs if the PPC's signals go down. That has proven challenging and resulted in having only one phase-worth of FET & Driver IC left. I'm waiting for parts that will arrive by Thursday this week so I can be back up with all 3-phases again.

The remedy for solving the FET safeguards issue is 'none at all'. I'll just make sure the PPC is healthy and putting out signals to the FET Driver ICs.

Again, here is the Fet Board:
http://02d1852.netsolhost.com/radian..._FET_board.JPG

... and here are 3 photos showing a single phase from the PPC-controlled Fet Board. The Pulse Width is 1usec and the operational frequency is 42KHz:
http://02d1852.netsolhost.com/radian...rain_pulse.png
http://02d1852.netsolhost.com/radian...rain_pulse.png
http://02d1852.netsolhost.com/radian...e-to-choke.png

"PPC_signal_and_drain_pulse" shows the PPC signal (green) and the FET's output. "PPC_drain_pulse" shows just the FET's output. "PPC_diode-to-choke" is the output 'after' the Diodes and 'before' the Choke. There is virtually nothing visible on B+ (after the Choke).

Please note the slight oscillations on the pulse at the beginning of the full-on part of the pulse. This oscillation seems to be a reflection of the PPC pulse, but is only there when it is driving the Gate Driver IC's input pin. I don't know if this needs tending to. So far there have been no compromises nor need for 'tweaking' and I'd like to keep it that way.

I will have much, much more on this effort once I am back up on 3-phases.

Later

[7imix]

Greg, looks beautiful. What kind of amperage is it drawing?

Does anyone know a good solution for socketing the mosfets? I would like to be able to easily replace any blown components.

[gmeast]

socketing

Greg, looks beautiful. What kind of amperage is it drawing?

Does anyone know a good solution for socketing the mosfets? I would like to be able to easily replace any blown components.

Hi 7imix,

The controller is drawing 68mA. I don't have a shunt hooked up on the battery. I suppose, based on what I said in my post, I could put a shunt at B+ because there don't seem to be any perturbations there. Other power stuff I prefer to compute by integration (scope curve areas).

Bob sort of poo-poo'd W's setup in the video(s) referring to how far away his FETS were from the driver IC's and also said that the huge heat sink he used was a major overkill. I'm socketing my gate driver chips for sure. I don't know what to do about the FETs yet, but socketing those is also a 'must-do'. If I come up with anything, I'll let you know. "The fewer connections - the better" ... I'm sure is a major theme here.

Back on current ... I am looking into the use of 'thermo-ammeters' as a better way to measure current draw. They are clumsy, less accurate BUT ARE NOT affected by transients. Measuring 'pulse energy' with store-bought & eBay gauges and meters is grossly inaccurate and the results are misleading.

When talking of scalar potentials and longitudinal energy, waves? and so on, I don't think that stuff can be measured using conventional devices anyway.

Thanks for reading my post ... can't wait to get back up and running ... fully phased????? ha

Later

[7imix]

I totally agree on the thermo-ammeters, I'd like to get one for testing too. Accurate measurement of this stuff is the most difficult aspect of it, I think.

[gmeast]

haretical builders

I totally agree on the thermo-ammeters, I'd like to get one for testing too. Accurate measurement of this stuff is the most difficult aspect of it, I think.

Yes ... measurement's a *b*i*t*c*h* for sure. It's too bad so many well-meaning experimenters have fooled themselves into thinking they have achieved COP>1. Measurement issues and concerns include the following: 'what to measure' ... 'where to measure' ... 'how to measure' ... 'what to measure with' ... 'how to interpret measurement data' ... and the list is practically endless. What's just as depressing is how many (ignorant) people with $money have placed $millions with (equally as ignorant and sometimes arrogant) experimenters only to see those $millions vaporize.

I applied through the admissions link to Heretical Builders and have heard no reply. I guess someone has blocked me from joining that forum. Well that's fine I guess. The less said (right now) about my PPC and help I've received from Bob Boyce ... the better. I haven't heard from him lately and have PM'd him several times with a couple of specific question. I feel like I'm turning into the Lone Ranger here.

I'll post what I can as soon as I have more. I'd really like to get my PPC on a PCB, but thing are still very tight.

Later

[gmeast]

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Does anyone know a good solution for socketing the mosfets? I would like to be able to easily replace any blown components.

Hi 7imix,

My solution to 'socketing' things goes like this:
1) Place on-board sockets for the driver ICs

*****Sockets for power components can have POOR connections****

2) My solution for the MOSFETs is to simply make them more accessible.

I extended the connections for the FETs out of the board where I can solder the FET pins onto THESE extensions thereby eliminating the need to mess with the back of the board and possibly create a problem.

In one picture, you can see 3 pairs of 3 wires coming up out of the board. These are for the FET pins.

In the other picture, you can see the empty spaces (between the 0.1uF caps) where the sockets for the gate driver ICs will go ... when they arrive. Also in this picture, you can see some burned spots where I held a couple of barbecues.

Pictures here:
http://02d1852.netsolhost.com/radian...T _Upgrade.JPG
http://02d1852.netsolhost.com/radian...r _Upgrade.JPG

Later

[Farmhand]

Hi Greg, Any Chance of a drawing of the counter and Phase setups ? So I can build it.

Cheers

[gmeast]

drawings

Hi Greg, Any Chance of a drawing of the counter and Phase setups ? So I can build it.

Cheers

Hi Farmhand,

I'm ashamed to admit I still don't have even one partial drawing of this thing yet. I got so caught up in the FET board thing, it took way too much time. I'm trying to harden up the design of the Phase board such that it's easy to use in either 'simple' PPC mode or 'full' PPC mode (full PWM per Phase board). A single Phase board consists of 2 'simple' phases or one 'full PWM' phase. I'm trying to make that fool-proof which I'm doing in-circuit.

Later