Combining power-supply needs - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: dferyance
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: November 28, 2016, 07:14:31 pm
content: Thus far, my power-supply needs for my hobby projects has been handled by the combination of battery power and and ebay buck converter that I put in a box along with a pot and voltage readout. Clearly this isn't a great setup but it mostly works for me. The main thing I wish I had in a power-supply is being able to do current limiting as right now I am stuck with just short-circuit protection. So I have been considering a power supply for a little while yet. Having multiple voltages would also be great but hasn't been too big of a deal.The tricky thing with how many hobbies I have is that I recently have gotten into electroplating. I've been doing metals with good success but want to do ceramic coating. Ceramic coating requires about 50V. The supplier sells a Mastech HY6003D which is a 60V 3Amp linear power supply (http://www.mastechpowersupply.com/volteq-regulated-variable-dc-power-supply-hy6003d-60v-3a-new-model.html) which is recommends for the task.From just searching the forums and the price, this looks like your basic cheap Chinese power-supply with questionable quality. I might be ok with that as long as it doesn't electrocute me. I've considered getting a used high-quality power supply but finding one that does 60V without being really expensive hasn't worked out. So I am stuck thinking about this Mastech. My question is more along the lines of if this would be useful to use for electronics work as well? Can a linear power-supply designed for 60v be use effectively at 3v? Am I mistaken by trying to combine my low-voltage low-current power needs with high-voltage and high-current?Any other ideas to do cheap 50V linear power? I pretty much just need 50V without being adjustable. If I can do that, I could spring for a better, reputable power supply for electronics. I've thought about a bunch of batteries in series but I wouldn't have good voltage control on that.

author: rrinker
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: November 29, 2016, 01:08:06 am
content: For the most versatility, you might want to look at a dual 30V supply that can be wired in series for 60V. So you get hobby electronic voltages (plus you can also wire them to give you a +/- dual rail supply for op amps and the like) plus the 60V you need for electroplating work.Specific choices, I'm watching along with you, My only bench supply is an HP 3610A, which is a single supply good for 8V at 3A or 15V at 2A max. Old but solid, and you can get them on ebay fairly cheap. No fancy computer interface stuff or programmability, just dial in the voltage and current limit. And they are linear, not switching, so low noise. A decent dual supply is maybe the only other bit of kit I could use on my bench, although so far nothing I've been doing would need it.

author: dferyance
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: November 29, 2016, 02:39:01 am
content: Thanks for the dual 30V idea. I hadn't even thought of that but it makes sense. I looked up some manuals of dual power supplies and sure enough, there are ones that support series operation. That opens up more options for me.