Author Topic: DC load using a CPU cooler  (Read 57235 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline Mr.B

  • Supporter
  • ****
  • Posts: 1249
  • Country: nz
Re: DC load using a CPU cooler
« Reply #175 on: October 21, 2014, 09:20:52 am »
I am using similar components to @microbug.
Sharing the knowledge on this thread...

Looking for a good closed loop fan controller for my DC load...
As you may have noticed in previous posts, I intend using a water cooler for my DC load - One pump, one fan.
I want a supervisory device that fits the following profile:
Sits on the SPI bus.
Has one or two PWM outputs for fan control.
Has two tacho inputs for fan speed measurement.
Has one or more temperature measurements.
Has closed loop temperature control.

A good example, but over the top for my application, is the Analog Devices ADT7470.
http://www.analog.com/static/imported-files/data_sheets/ADT7470.pdf
In fact, Analog Devices have a lot of cool devices that almost fit the bill... but not quite...

Anyone had any experience with this issue?
Any recommendations?

Much appreciated.
Where are we going, and why are we in a handbasket?
 

Online Jeroen3

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 4209
  • Country: nl
  • Embedded Engineer
    • jeroen3.nl
Re: DC load using a CPU cooler
« Reply #176 on: October 21, 2014, 10:07:33 am »
Why don't you mount a 4 wire fan with a ~25 KHz pwm timer and a timer capture input.
All should be available in your mcu, excluding the level shifting and protection.
After all, you want to be sensing using an RTD in the TO's mount hole anyway. Which is probably not an SMbus device.
 

Offline Mr.B

  • Supporter
  • ****
  • Posts: 1249
  • Country: nz
Re: DC load using a CPU cooler
« Reply #177 on: October 21, 2014, 07:16:34 pm »
Thanks Jeroen3.
Yes, the MCU will be more than capable of doing that, however it is not really the way I want to do it.
My design consists of one "Display and MCU" module, with up to three "Power" modules.
The idea was to build the Display and MCU module with one Power module, then further down the track I could add more Power modules.
By having everything on one serial bus it means the potential three Power modules can be simply daisy chained.
The chip selects are managed by simple implementation of a 595 serial to parallel shift register.
By using a closed loop controller it is just one less thing to have to worry about in the MCU.
Where are we going, and why are we in a handbasket?
 

Offline Joenuh

  • Newbie
  • Posts: 8
Re: DC load using a CPU cooler
« Reply #178 on: November 11, 2014, 08:16:02 pm »
Any updates on this project?
 

Offline microbugTopic starter

  • Frequent Contributor
  • **
  • Posts: 568
  • Country: gb
  • Electronics Enthusiast
Re: DC load using a CPU cooler
« Reply #179 on: November 16, 2014, 10:52:51 am »
I've been extremely busy of late so this project is currently on hold. Updates as follows:
- I got a Freezer i30 CPU cooler.
- The heat pipes on the CPU cooler are flattened and milled smooth at the point where they make contact with the load (a 'patented system' by ARCTIC). This will mean less effort and better thermal connection when connecting the FETs.
- The cooler is smaller than I expected: I can see that it would do 300W, but it's impressive.
- The enclosure will probably be plastic with a hole cut in the top for the heatsink.
- I ordered and received one of the $4 PSoC 4 dev boards.
- I'm planning to use the PSoC dev board in the final design since it has a USB>serial converter on it and the included PSoC is pre-programmed with a boot loader.
- The load will have USB connectivity so that it can be reprogrammed easily. This will mean I can get the hardware over with before the software.

I've been designing with daily builds of KiCad. I find them fine in stability, and if a build is unstable it will usually be fixed tomorrow! When I have more time (Christmas holidays coming up) I'll do some more work and upload the R1 design to hackaday.io .
« Last Edit: November 16, 2014, 10:57:15 am by microbug »
 

Offline kalj

  • Contributor
  • Posts: 34
  • Country: se
Re: DC load using a CPU cooler
« Reply #180 on: July 06, 2020, 07:06:00 am »
I've been extremely busy of late so this project is currently on hold. Updates as follows:
- I got a Freezer i30 CPU cooler.
- The heat pipes on the CPU cooler are flattened and milled smooth at the point where they make contact with the load (a 'patented system' by ARCTIC). This will mean less effort and better thermal connection when connecting the FETs.
- The cooler is smaller than I expected: I can see that it would do 300W, but it's impressive.
- The enclosure will probably be plastic with a hole cut in the top for the heatsink.
- I ordered and received one of the $4 PSoC 4 dev boards.
- I'm planning to use the PSoC dev board in the final design since it has a USB>serial converter on it and the included PSoC is pre-programmed with a boot loader.
- The load will have USB connectivity so that it can be reprogrammed easily. This will mean I can get the hardware over with before the software.

I've been designing with daily builds of KiCad. I find them fine in stability, and if a build is unstable it will usually be fixed tomorrow! When I have more time (Christmas holidays coming up) I'll do some more work and upload the R1 design to hackaday.io .

@microbug : What happened to the project? Did you finish it?
« Last Edit: July 07, 2020, 01:34:06 am by kalj »
 


Share me

Digg  Facebook  SlashDot  Delicious  Technorati  Twitter  Google  Yahoo
Smf