Friday, August 19, 2016

Killing a Perfectly good Power Supply

Killing a Perfectly good Power Supply



For a few years i've had the TP1527PS power supply matched to a TP820CD dual charger and never experienced any problems.

Recently I wanted to share the power supply with another device and lowered the output voltage from 27V to 15V. I then proceeded to to charge 2 4S 5000 mAh batteries. 

Unfortunately the power supply died emitting a loud POP and died with a burn smell.

What in the world happened? I had charged those LIPOs before using a 12V car battery before. Why switching the power supply to 15V would cause it to die.

Well lets think about power requirements.

To charge a 4S 5000 mAh battery we need just over 100 Watts:
4.2V * 4 * 5A * 120% = 100.8 W

To charge 2 4S 5000 mAh battery we need just over 200 Watts:
2 * 4.2V * 4 * 5A * 120% = 201.6 W

The TP1527PS states that it can provide 350W at 15V there. The assumption was that since our power requirements are about 60% of the maximum supported by the Power Supply we would be ok.

As it turn out this was wrong. The Power Supply gave up and died while charging the second set of batteries.

Why? Any ideas?

All I can think is that the 201.6W pulled continuously of the power supply caused something to fail. That is sad considering this is rated for 350W at 15V... 

sad for a power supply costing $150.00 + 


There are really not two channels. But two sets of connectors connected to the same output channel:


Hard to see if there is something else broken here:

The only fuse in the box seems to be in good shape:


The capacitor looks fried ... It may have taken out the IC next to it too... 
I may get bold and attempt to replace the capacitor


Capacitors just fail sometimes





2 comments:

  1. I am also the user of power supply and charge my batteries by the mean of them. They are super fast.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I am also the user of power supply and charge my batteries by the mean of them. They are super fast.

    ReplyDelete