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Participant

Join Date: Jun 2012
Posts: 3

DC-DC Converter

06/13/2012 8:10 PM

Hello Everyone...

Hi I am sandeep..I want to is der any possible design for a boost converter which has an input ranging from 0.3 or 0.2 to 0.8 V..and milli amps current..so that i can convert it to a 3V or 5V usable energy..

I am doing this for a pyro materail..i got the output from pyro as 0.2 to 0.8V..so i need a boost converter which can do a simulation in pspice...help me in Dzz...:)

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Pathfinder Tags: dc-dc converter energy harvesting
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#1

Re: DC-DC Converter

06/13/2012 8:41 PM
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#2
In reply to #1

Re: DC-DC Converter

06/13/2012 8:48 PM

Thanks for your reply,

In my project, My task is to convert voltage from a pyro material to a usable Voltage using Step up converter in pspice. i am done with getting the voltage from the pyro material, its about 0.2V to 0.8V around..with very current..milliamps...may be micro amps...Now i need a boost converter so that it hooks up the voltage to like..3V..so i am looking around for a good design of boost converter..i need your sujjestions and help..Thank you..

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#3
In reply to #2

Re: DC-DC Converter

06/13/2012 9:23 PM
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#4

Re: DC-DC Converter

06/13/2012 10:31 PM

You cannot get something for nothing. If your only power source is capable of less than a milliwatt of power (0.2V*2mA=0.4mW) then that's all the power available to you. So if you could could get a 100% efficient switching supply to work at these levels (not very likely) the most amount of current you could get at 3V will be hundreds of micro-amperes at best.

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Join Date: Nov 2006
Location: Ontario, Canada
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#5

Re: DC-DC Converter

06/13/2012 11:13 PM

You could try a Joule Thief but I doubt it would work below 0.8V

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#6

Re: DC-DC Converter

06/14/2012 4:14 AM

Considering that most semiconductor junctions require about 0.5v to function then I think you will be struggling.
Maybe you can connect several of your devices to give you a more useable starting voltage. I'd suggest 2v is a reasonable workable minimum unless you are an expert electronics and semiconductor designer.
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#7

Re: DC-DC Converter

06/14/2012 3:58 PM

the DC Dc convertors I have used have worked in th eother direction. I needed to guarentee 24VDC from a supply that varied from 28VDC to 36VDC. The convertor gave out exactly 24VDC regardless of the input volts.

Remember you cannot get out more energy than you put in. Normally to increase volts you must transform it with a transformer - an AC device. Although the volts would increase your current has to decrease - you cannot get more out than you put in.

Rock on with PSPICE!

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#8

Re: DC-DC Converter

06/15/2012 8:24 AM

Yes, Sandeep, you are in luck. There are several excellent ICs designed specifically for this task.

By way of introduction to these ICs may I point out that the task is to run electronics on a very low voltage. This can be done with depletion-mode JFETs and MOSFETs. As opposed to the common enhancement-mode FET, which requires a gate voltage to turn it ON, usually several volts, depletion-mode parts are ON at zero-volt gate bias, and require a negative voltage to turn them OFF.

So, imagine we make a little transformer-coupled oscillator with a depletion-mode FET. You apply an external low-voltage source. Since the FET is ON with zero-volts gate bias, it starts conducting a modest drain current from your low voltage. And since it's now operating in linear mode, as an amplifier, it makes a tiny amount of noise. But we have a 100x step-up transformer which makes this small noise voltage higher and presents it to the gate. Furthermore, the FET wants to amplify and invert any gate signals.

The gate-drain-transformer scene becomes a kind of push-up/push-down dance, which quickly turns into a full-fledged oscillation, and voila, your modest input voltage is now 100x larger, big enough to efficiently rectify with signal diodes, etc. That's the basis for the input stage of input stage of Linear Technology's LTC3108 and LTC3109 (links).

The '3108 requires a positive voltage to run its oscillator, and the '3109 has two oscillators so it can work with either input-voltage polarity, or AC. These ICs will operate from as little as 20 to 30mV, although they do better when the voltage is 0.05 to 0.5 volts. At higher input voltages, lower transformer ratios of 50x or 20x are recommended. The '3108 and '3109 are fairly complicated chips (block diagram below), with several regulators, control switches, etc, meant to charge capacitors or batteries and switch power for short-duration high-current activities. The LTC3108 costs $6.28 at DigiKey. There's also an TLC3108-1 with different output voltage options.

LTC has a video presentation and also an LTSpice demo, which you load into LTSpice to see.

DigiKey offers a 14-page, 10-minute "training module" - you can the click the next-page arrow to quickly move past the boring parts and save time, or you can chose the non-audio version. Pages 7 and 8 are quite interesting.

For voltages above 0.4 to 0.5 volts, other more conventional schemes may be better suited. Linear Technology offers the LTC3105 step-up boost converter for applications having at least 250mV available. This IC also has a technology called maximum-power-point control, or MPPC, in which the input is loaded down until it's voltage drops far enough so the power extracted is less than the maximum. This is especially well suited for photovoltaic sources, but the converter should work well with many types of power sources.

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Participant

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#9
In reply to #8

Re: DC-DC Converter

06/15/2012 6:34 PM

Thanks Winfield..it was helpful..But i am in still confusion when i am doing through simulation..as u showed in a green page..Circuit defining for energy harvest, my source is a 0v to 0.8V pulse source with milliamps..can u draw the actual circuit how it looks..is it the same joule thief circuit..and can you tell me what is the .model statement for the depletion mosfet for this application

Thanks

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Power-User

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#10
In reply to #9

Re: DC-DC Converter

06/15/2012 10:03 PM

Whoa, you would like everything handed to you on a platter! I like SPICE, but it has its limits. This is especially true when it comes to models. With respect to the little circuit I showed you, I would feel better if you purchased a few parts and measured the relevant parameters, gm and VGS vs ID, for example, rather than asking about SPICE models.

But since you asked, most SPICE MOSFET models are a disaster at low currents, where linear operation happens, because it's the subthreshold region. Bottom line, you have to create your own special models.

You may have better luck with JFET models. One important thing that's usually missing from both model types: noise.

Without noise you can't hope to SPICE-model the circuit, because it won't start oscillating. What's more, without all the parameters just right, it won't bear much resemblance to the real circuit. You'll probably be better off with analytical approaches to analyzing the circuit.

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