POWER SUPPLIES

 POWER SUPPLIES – PRODCUCT RANGE OVERVIEW

Power Supplies are used in electricity supply, i.e. industrial control engineering and consumer electronics devices, to galvanically isolate and transform voltages or to generate several other DC voltages from one available voltage. The selection of the most suitable device in each case must be chosen from various points of view. Aspects such as space requirements, stability of the output voltage, thermal radiation, operational safety and costs are taken into account. In the field of power supply units, a distinction can be made between three basic types. Unregulated power supplies, linear regulated power supplies and clocked power supplies. The three types of power supply mentioned are explained in more detail below.

Linear Regulated Power Supplies

Linear regulated Power Supplies have the same basic structure as the unregulated Power Supplies described above, but they also have a downstream electronic regulator that can keep the output voltage constant regardless of mains fluctuations and load. There is only an extremely low residual ripple. The disadvantage of linearly regulated power supplies is the heat loss at the regulating transistor, which must be dissipated by clever cooling. For this reason, sufficient heat dissipation must be ensured when installing in complete control systems.

Clocked Power Supplies

Clocked Power Supplies can be further divided into two categories. In a primary clocked device, the clocking and voltage transfer on the primary circuit is done by an oscillating transformer and after switched rectification to the output side. In secondary clocked devices, the voltage transfer is done through a power transformer with rectifier and filtering. Thus the same technology as with an unregulated power supply. On the output side, a clock regulator is also connected in series. This generates the stabilized output voltage through a storage choke and smoothing capacitor. This type of function is also known as a choke converter. In all clocked power supplies, the output voltage is not clocked to a fixed absolute value of power, but is regulated between an upper and lower limit. This results in a superimposed output voltage whose frequency is equal to the clock frequency. Clocked power supplies are used when one or more stable DC voltages are required, but compact design and low heat dissipation are important.

Differentiation Between AC And DC Power Supply

The distinction in AC power supply and DC power supply is based on the available energy, which is defined in used input voltage and the type of output voltage. AC stands for alternating current and DC for direct current. Both the DC power supply and the AC power supply are available with different power. These variations are necessary, because on the one hand in the various regions of the world is partly operated with different mains voltages and on the other hand the electronic components need different voltages and currents to achieve the high efficiency. In this case, the power is adjusted by the voltage with the necessary current.
The most common in Europe is the 12V – power supply and the 24V – power supply with different power, which is expressed in watts. Electronic components of this type are used not only in multimedia devices, but also in highly complex switchgear.
In addition to the AC power supply and the DC power supply, AC/DC converter modules, DC/AC converters and DC/DC converters are also found in control systems and devices. The first two variants ensure that AC voltage is converted to DC voltage or vice versa, while the pure DC converters change the voltage. Business owners who need electronic components for their series production are well advised to make use of the manufacturer’s B2B services and product range. The advantage of this is that the experience gained with the range of electronic components can be incorporated into the project planning and thus there is always the guarantee of being able to implement the best possible solution for the power supply of the inner workings of the devices manufactured.