 Notice. New forum software under development. It's going to miss a few functions and look a bit ugly for a while, but I'm working on it full time now as the old forum was too unstable. Couple days, all good. If you notice any issues, please contact me. |
Forum Index : Electronics : PicAxe Charger
  Page 2 of 2 |
|||||
| Author | Message | ||||
Gill Senior Member  Joined: 11/11/2006 Location: AustraliaPosts: 669 |
G'day vasi, I seem to be having trouble with downloading the software. The link doesn't work in one and in the other, I don't seem to do the right things. Could you please help knowing I am just a Windows XP user and am not aware of all that fancy stuff you need to do to get Linux running? was working fine... til the smoke got out. Cheers Gill _Cairns, FNQ |
||||
vasi Guru  Joined: 23/03/2007 Location: RomaniaPosts: 1697 |
Hi Gill, You're right, link was broken... now corrected (DIY Fever site). I'm using an old version of this software, for Win98 but actual version have many types of electronic components. THe strip board can have any dimension. The board can be strip, perf or pcb. But it have one drawback: it needs Java for running. Because of Java, it can run on any operating system. I think you can add more components because it use XML files for definitions. I found it because I couldn't use Stripboard Designer under Win98 ... And I think it looks nice. You can give it a try (the new version is still in beta but is usable and the older one have a limited set of components). I use Win98 on an old computer which have parallel and serial ports... I must find a larger HDD to install also Linux with EMC (actual one have 4.7Gb and is full). Hobbit name: Togo Toadfoot of Frogmorton Elvish name: Mablung Miriel Beyound Arduino Lang |
||||
| boelle Newbie  Joined: 02/01/2011 Location: DenmarkPosts: 13 |
Hi I hate to bring this old one out in the light again. I have been looking for a charger to charge my car's battery and there are a few options: I can go in the store and get some that just charge and then stops, or the old cooker models that just keeps on and on. The models that keeps topping up are way to expensive. So my idea was to take the old cooker model that can put out 15 Amps, and let a picaxe control it. I have one in the basement and only use it when I can keep an eye on it. Its very basic with a big trafo and a meter plus a switch to go between normal charge and fast charge. I'm not good at designing but i'm very skilled at assembling so I started looking arround to see some that have done the same before. Either i'm blind or something but I could not find anything. My idea was to use Gill's Mod but i need to remove a few parts, first one is the Dumb resistor, i guess there is no point in putting more load on the trafo than goes in the battery. It could be nice to know how much the trafo can spit out and also what the battery eats. But is this possible? For the piezo my idea was to use it to make a beep every 1 min to tell float is reached. I have looked at the veroboard layout from the zip and have a few Q's: The switch have a DUMP pos. I guess this can be replaced by a simple on/off switch and another to select forced boost or automatic mode, are there any components that could be removed or than the dump resistor? Just under the sw_menu text it says: LED No Taper... what does this mean? Could the bat, gen and avail singals be connected directly to an allegro sensor or does it need some pre-condition ? The Text's "2nd Load" and "LED 2nd load"... do the lead tell when in boost or not? How hard would it be to have the charger compensate float according to bat temperature? I hope somebody has the time to help me out A happy new year to all |
||||
Solar Rat Newbie Joined: 02/01/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 3 |
Hi all, I'm new to this forum, and excited. I've just discovered it, and I've long been looking for a good electronics forum. It looks as if I may just have found it. I'm an electronics hobbyist/tinkerer from way back, but haven't done much in the last 6 or 7 years. But recently, I've felt the need to design and build a battery charge regulator between my solar panels and a 120 volt battery. I have already roughly designed a PWM regulator around a UC3527AN voltage mode PWM controller IC, and am just waiting for RS to deliver the bits and the breadboard to start playing. But after reading this thread, I have discovered this IC called PICAXE. I'll have to do some reading up on it, to see if I might be better served by using it. Can someone please give me a basic overview of what it can do, and where I might find some useful articles on it. The charger/regulator I have in mind will run the full output from 4 PV panels in series, through the charger, and into the battery. Once the battery reaches its full voltage, and charge tapers off, I want to divert the excess power/voltage to another array of 6 panels, connected to a grid connected inverter. Basically, the circuit will simply have a single input +ve terminal, and two output terminals, "A" and "B", (and a -ve or common terminal). While battery charging is called for, the PWM on "A" (to the battery) will have all the power, but as the battery voltage rises, that PWM output will decrease, while the PWM output on "B" will increase proportionally, and send power to the other array and GCI. Also, can someone please tell me what GTI and TSR mean? And what is "BUCK", "BOOST" and "DUMP" in a windmill controller? If anyone has any ideas that they can contribute to my charge controller, please feel free to contribute. No doubt I'll have plenty of other questions also soon. Thank you, and I look forward to some fruitful conversations here. Regards, Mike. May our sons shine brightly |
||||
| vasi Guru Joined: 23/03/2007 Location: RomaniaPosts: 1697 |
Hi Mike, Regarding to PICAXE, all info you need is here: http://www.rev-ed.co.uk/picaxe/ Vasi Hobbit name: Togo Toadfoot of Frogmorton Elvish name: Mablung Miriel Beyound Arduino Lang |
||||
| boelle Newbie Joined: 02/01/2011 Location: DenmarkPosts: 13 |
been thinking a bit further... would it also be possible to add a function that can load test the battery? ie use a few headlight bulbs to load it at very high amps for 10 sec' as to test if it can stay above 9.7 Volts and if it goes 50% up after load has been removed. and a desulfator mode where it will switch in a desulfator curcuit and just monitor voltage... if voltage goes below 11Volts it should take out the desulfator and charge to set voltage and then back to desulfator.. maybe have it count amphours every lets say 6 hours and stop desulfation when amphours does not increase. the rutine could be started with an amphour test... ie charge up and count amphours and then desulfate and test every 6 hours until no increase. the display should tell voltage and initial amphours and extra amphours since intial test. if i forgot last time it should also have forced chargeif you are in a hurry, and trickle charge so you can leave it in forever without boiling the battery... maybe extend the trickle routine so it will count amphours every 12 hours if it has been trickle charging for at least 12 hours. To take max care of the battery it should compensate for temp in all modes. as you can see i'm a thinker... loads of ideas, my downside is that i'm not good at designing... but no problems at assemble or build it from schematic... i just need a very helping hand... some might call it spoonfeeding, but well i still have hopes |
||||
Downwind Guru Joined: 09/09/2009 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2333 |
GTI....Grid tied inverter TSR....Tip speed rotation DUMP.... Diversion load for a windmill, normally a large resistor of some sort. The Picaxe is a great little chip and i tried to use it for a battery charger controller with PWM some years back and found it caused over heating in the mosfets with the frequencies needed in pwm control. (miller effect) Pete. Sometimes it just works |
||||
| boelle Newbie Joined: 02/01/2011 Location: DenmarkPosts: 13 |
would it be better if i started my own thread? could be an amazing charger if i could get the help to mod what gill have build still loads of ideas |
||||
| Downwind Guru Joined: 09/09/2009 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2333 |
Well it is polite to have your own thread and not to Hijack someone elses thread. What experiance do you have with electronics and design/construction. You have some big ideas to squeeze into a little box. Hope you are up for the job and not expecting someone else to build it for you. Good luck Pete. Sometimes it just works |
||||
| boelle Newbie Joined: 02/01/2011 Location: DenmarkPosts: 13 |
well... the design side is the one that troubles me the most. but construction no problem if i just have a schematic.. |
||||
| Solar Rat Newbie Joined: 02/01/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 3 |
Thanks Vasi, I had a read there, it sounds very versatile. I'll have to see if I can get one or two and have a play, Cheers, Mike. 
May our sons shine brightly |
||||
| Solar Rat Newbie Joined: 02/01/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 3 |
Thanks Pete. So GTI and GCI (Grid Connected) are the same for me. OK, so with the MOSFET thing, do the PICAXES run at very high speeds? I was going to use a PWM control IC, and run it at around 50KHz. I have almost finalised my design. My last holdup was designing a dc-dc converter, with two isolated outputs, to power my two MOSFET Drivers, which have to float at the output voltage, and can't be tied to either the pos or neg rails, so the driver/mosfet stages have to have a floating 12 volt power supply, and be triggered by opto couplers (that bit is easy). So I have opted for a couple of commercial dc-dc converters, 72 volt I/P and 12v O/P. I'll wire the inputs in series, so they can be powered almost directly from my solar panel input, at about 145 - 170 volts, and the two outputs to their respective tasks. By the sounds of it, my second output will perform a similar duty to the "dump" feature of a windmill regulator, as when my batts are charged, the output will swing over to the second output, which will be in series with, and "add" to the voltage of another array, which feeds a GTI. So I will effectively "dump" my excess capacity to the grid. Sorry to all for my "indiscretion" of not starting my own thread, I am fairly new to forums, and didn't realise this "rule". Also, I still don't know what Buck and Boost are, but I think they are SMPS types. Am I right? Or in this context, do they refer to something different? Cheers all, and thanks again Pete. Mike. May our sons shine brightly |
||||
| Downwind Guru Joined: 09/09/2009 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2333 |
Hi Mike, As far as i know there is no hard and fast rules on adding to a thread, but to hijack a thread is not polite, also threads get messy with add ons and things become lost in the depths of the forum. A new thread and title helps the forum operate better and keeps traffic on the forum, as google and other search engines pick up on the threads and they are listed for others who search for information to. The picaxe is a rather slow chip over all but some of the newer generation chips can be overclocked to 32meg or even 64meg in some cases. 50K pwm is within the picaxe range. The trick will be finding a mosfet to operate effectively at this speed. Look up Miller plateau effect on mosfets. Its basically a flat spot in the on/off curve of a mosfet and at high speed switching the mosfet can hover within this area and not fully switch on/off causing it to heat up quickly with high current loads. What mosfet driver are you referring to in your circuit and is it a commercial type like some listed in the pdf below. Running at 4meg with what you want to do, the instruction time might be rather slow in processing data, as it can take approx 2mS per line. I did not quote an answer to Buck and Boost as these are not something that i have a clear knowledge of, and Gordon is the person that has worked in the design of these not me. He now finds the forum limiting so often wont answer single line posts. Pete. 2011-01-10_231023_ucc27322_Driver.pdf 2011-01-10_231119_Mosfet_drivers.pdf Sometimes it just works |
||||
| Page 2 of 2 |
|||||
 Print this page |
