
Bookmaker
USA
Asked
— Edited
DJ,
I have managed to hook up alot of servos and I find that the voltage regulator overheats and the servos will no longer hold their respective positions. If I shut them down for a few minutes then everythig is fine again. I plan on making a large heat sink but I am wondering if that will be enough. Would a fan be a good idea? Has anyone done this and what kind of area should I go for on the heat sink? Any advise would be appreciated.
There is a solder pad on the board near the bottom right. If that pad is cut (with a razor knife) then you can provide alternate power to the digital I/O pins along the right side of the board.
Try a larger heatsink first and see what kind of results you get.
IMHO try thermal compound, then a bigger heatsink (with thermal compound) and if you still need more current capabilities try the external power trick that DJ mentioned, just make sure you don't supply the servos with much more than 6V cause that's the limit of most of em'. You'll want to be in the 4.8 to 6 Volt range.
Edit: So it's actually called Silicone Heat Transfer Compound by M.G. Chemicals. The tube I have has lasted me about 3 years and it looks like it'll last me 3 more years for the price of $16. I use it on my voltage regulators, CPUs, and GPUs. The thermal conductance isn't as great as Arctic Silver but it outlasts it by far.
Thermal Grease
I picked up some heatsink compound on the way home and disassembled the EZ-B just to find that it already had compound between the heatsinks and the LM 1084's. I put some more on just for good luck. I will let you know the outcome when I get it hooked up again.
I put a small fan on the existing heatsinks and it is working fine so far. $6. 75 at the local computer store.
Will that work? I think most fans run on 5v power and this is 14.7, do I need to drop the voltage?
I picked up a VGA aluminum heatsink and 40mm fan pushing around 5 cu ft min , thermal compound is between the original heatsink and new one. I wanted this cooling solution to be completely reversable. On a EASIER idea however radioshack has excellent heatsink kits that are 2:50 each and predrilled to fit our regulars.