QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s
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QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s
John Larkin wrote: Eeyore wrote: Stunningly bizarre! Do elaborate. I know the circuit very well actually. I've improved it hugely in a series of amplifiers I designed also using the 'grounded collector' arrangement. Graham |
QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s
On Sat, 31 Mar 2007 11:33:40 +0100, Eeyore
wrote: Stunningly bizarre! John |
QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s
John Larkin wrote: Eeyore wrote: John Larkin wrote: Eeyore wrote: Stunningly bizarre! Do elaborate. I know the circuit very well actually. I've improved it hugely in a series of amplifiers I designed also using the 'grounded collector' arrangement. Where to begin? Is this amp supposed to be based on the patent you posted? It isn't. The patent relates to a protection method, not the amplifier design. This amplifier does indeed use that protection method. The output stage is magnificently twisted, just to implement a silly and inefficient transistor protection scheme. Actually it's done that way for a completely different reason AIUI. The same algorithm could be implemented much more quantitatively with a few opamps and diodes, off the side of the main signal path instead of all tangled with it. Do go on. Beta-dependent design sucks. I agree. Those trimpots are loathesome. Way too many parts. Must be hell to work on. It actually has a far lower parts count than most amplifiers of that variety. Before-feedback output impedance must be insane, leading to interesting dynamics. Uhuh. It's variable shall we say ? I've seen this phenom elsewhere. Somebody gets an idea, falls in love with it, and bends the entire design around it, usually badly. It was Pat Quilter's trademark for ages. They've finally adopted emitter followers now. I like to protect transistors by digitizing their voltages and currents, and the heatsink temperature, running a realtime thermal simulation, and limiting *junction temperature*. Digitising ? That's not going to be cheap. Graham |
QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s
John Larkin wrote: Eeyore wrote: I've seen this phenom elsewhere. Somebody gets an idea, falls in love with it, and bends the entire design around it, usually badly. It was Pat Quilter's trademark for ages. They've finally adopted emitter followers now. Horray! Give them another 20 years, and they may discover fets! Personally I love the lateral 'audio fets' that Hitachi originated. Hitachi no longer make them although there are some other suppliers. They are *very* expensive though compared to bipolars.. I like to protect transistors by digitizing their voltages and currents, and the heatsink temperature, running a realtime thermal simulation, and limiting *junction temperature*. Digitising ? That's not going to be cheap. Digitizing is cheap, especially when it lets you safely get, say, twice the usable power from a given mass of transistors and heatsinks. You don't. Audio amps already push output devices pretty much as far as they're happy with. Here's a question for you. Given a classic single channel of Class AB audio amplification with a rated output power of say 600 watts, what kind of thermal resistance would you require to allow it to continue to operate safely in typical use with an ambient air temp of up to 40C. Use any sensible 'assumptions' that you feel are required to calculate this.. Graham |
QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s
On Sat, 31 Mar 2007 18:07:26 +0100, Eeyore
wrote: John Larkin wrote: Eeyore wrote: Stunningly bizarre! Do elaborate. I know the circuit very well actually. I've improved it hugely in a series of amplifiers I designed also using the 'grounded collector' arrangement. Graham Where to begin? Is this amp supposed to be based on the patent you posted? It isn't. The output stage is magnificently twisted, just to implement a silly and inefficient transistor protection scheme. The same algorithm could be implemented much more quantitatively with a few opamps and diodes, off the side of the main signal path instead of all tangled with it. Beta-dependent design sucks. Way too many parts. Must be hell to work on. Before-feedback output impedance must be insane, leading to interesting dynamics. I've seen this phenom elsewhere. Somebody gets an idea, falls in love with it, and bends the entire design around it, usually badly. I like to protect transistors by digitizing their voltages and currents, and the heatsink temperature, running a realtime thermal simulation, and limiting *junction temperature*. John |
QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s
John Larkin wrote: Eeyore wrote: John Larkin wrote: I like to protect transistors by digitizing their voltages and currents, and the heatsink temperature, running a realtime thermal simulation, and limiting *junction temperature*. Digitising ? That's not going to be cheap. Digitizing is cheap, especially when it lets you safely get, say, twice the usable power from a given mass of transistors and heatsinks. You don't. Audio amps already push output devices pretty much as far as they're happy with. But they don't do it intelligently. A proper protection scheme can deliver a lot more usable power for the same amount of "push." You're missing the point. The 'push' is determined by the audio signal. Mess with that and you have distortion. The amplifier must function unimpeded for any valid combination of input level and output load. Graham |
QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s
On Sat, 31 Mar 2007 18:51:09 +0100, Eeyore
wrote: I've seen this phenom elsewhere. Somebody gets an idea, falls in love with it, and bends the entire design around it, usually badly. It was Pat Quilter's trademark for ages. They've finally adopted emitter followers now. Horray! Give them another 20 years, and they may discover fets! I like to protect transistors by digitizing their voltages and currents, and the heatsink temperature, running a realtime thermal simulation, and limiting *junction temperature*. Digitising ? That's not going to be cheap. Digitizing is cheap, especially when it lets you safely get, say, twice the usable power from a given mass of transistors and heatsinks. John |
QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s
John Larkin wrote: Eeyore wrote: John Larkin wrote: Eeyore wrote: John Larkin wrote: I like to protect transistors by digitizing their voltages and currents, and the heatsink temperature, running a realtime thermal simulation, and limiting *junction temperature*. Digitising ? That's not going to be cheap. Digitizing is cheap, especially when it lets you safely get, say, twice the usable power from a given mass of transistors and heatsinks. You don't. Audio amps already push output devices pretty much as far as they're happy with. But they don't do it intelligently. A proper protection scheme can deliver a lot more usable power for the same amount of "push." You're missing the point. The 'push' is determined by the audio signal. Mess with that and you have distortion. You're missing my point. If you can get twice the undistorted output by using a smarter protection circuit, it's still twice the output. How can you increase the allowable dissipation with a protection circuit ? Dissipation is determined by the audio signal and load impedance. The amplifier must function unimpeded for any valid combination of input level and output load. What does "unimpeded" mean for a huge input and a shorted load? A short isn't a valid load. Graham |
QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s
On Sat, 31 Mar 2007 19:12:00 +0100, Eeyore
wrote: John Larkin wrote: Eeyore wrote: I've seen this phenom elsewhere. Somebody gets an idea, falls in love with it, and bends the entire design around it, usually badly. It was Pat Quilter's trademark for ages. They've finally adopted emitter followers now. Horray! Give them another 20 years, and they may discover fets! Personally I love the lateral 'audio fets' that Hitachi originated. Hitachi no longer make them although there are some other suppliers. They are *very* expensive though compared to bipolars.. I like to protect transistors by digitizing their voltages and currents, and the heatsink temperature, running a realtime thermal simulation, and limiting *junction temperature*. Digitising ? That's not going to be cheap. Digitizing is cheap, especially when it lets you safely get, say, twice the usable power from a given mass of transistors and heatsinks. You don't. Audio amps already push output devices pretty much as far as they're happy with. But they don't do it intelligently. A proper protection scheme can deliver a lot more usable power for the same amount of "push." Here's a question for you. Given a classic single channel of Class AB audio amplification with a rated output power of say 600 watts, what kind of thermal resistance would you require to allow it to continue to operate safely in typical use with an ambient air temp of up to 40C. Use any sensible 'assumptions' that you feel are required to calculate this.. Graham Assume n=60%, 600 watts RMS out, the transistors dissipate 400 watts. For Tj of, say, 140C, we need a composite Tja of 0.25 K/w. But audio is not RMS sine waves, any more than NMR gradient pulses are. A smart protection circuit knows the true transistor dissipation and the actual heatsink temperature, and understands the thermal time constants. It has benefits like allowing lots of low-duty-cycle power, or protecting the parts at high ambients or if a fan fails or something. There's nothing that's a better thing to limit than actual junction temperature; anything else is a bad guess of varying badness. John |
QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s
On Sat, 31 Mar 2007 19:57:17 +0100, Eeyore
wrote: John Larkin wrote: Eeyore wrote: John Larkin wrote: I like to protect transistors by digitizing their voltages and currents, and the heatsink temperature, running a realtime thermal simulation, and limiting *junction temperature*. Digitising ? That's not going to be cheap. Digitizing is cheap, especially when it lets you safely get, say, twice the usable power from a given mass of transistors and heatsinks. You don't. Audio amps already push output devices pretty much as far as they're happy with. But they don't do it intelligently. A proper protection scheme can deliver a lot more usable power for the same amount of "push." You're missing the point. The 'push' is determined by the audio signal. Mess with that and you have distortion. You're missing my point. If you can get twice the undistorted output by using a smarter protection circuit, it's still twice the output. The amplifier must function unimpeded for any valid combination of input level and output load. What does "unimpeded" mean for a huge input and a shorted load? John |
QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s - Amp.jpg
1 Attachment(s)
On Sat, 31 Mar 2007 20:41:21 +0100, Eeyore
wrote: John Larkin wrote: Eeyore wrote: John Larkin wrote: Eeyore wrote: John Larkin wrote: I like to protect transistors by digitizing their voltages and currents, and the heatsink temperature, running a realtime thermal simulation, and limiting *junction temperature*. Digitising ? That's not going to be cheap. Digitizing is cheap, especially when it lets you safely get, say, twice the usable power from a given mass of transistors and heatsinks. You don't. Audio amps already push output devices pretty much as far as they're happy with. But they don't do it intelligently. A proper protection scheme can deliver a lot more usable power for the same amount of "push." You're missing the point. The 'push' is determined by the audio signal. Mess with that and you have distortion. You're missing my point. If you can get twice the undistorted output by using a smarter protection circuit, it's still twice the output. How can you increase the allowable dissipation with a protection circuit ? Dissipation is determined by the audio signal and load impedance. The point is to *know* the actual dissipation, not make a crude guess about it. Using a simple current limit, foldback limit, or the trick from the patent, if you want to make your amp reliable in actual use, you have to set the limits low, because your junction temp "calculation" sucks and can err wildly depending on input levels and duration, real/reactive loads, line voltage, and ambient temp. The amplifier must function unimpeded for any valid combination of input level and output load. What does "unimpeded" mean for a huge input and a shorted load? A short isn't a valid load. So it's OK for the amp to explode when shorted? A current limit that protects against a shorted load will severely limit peak power output into a normal load. How about this? 17 KW peak power out. Power supply rails programmable from +-75 to +-175 to match various loads. Intelligent digital simulated-junction-temperature shutdowns. The P and N fets are interleaved for best cooling, and the shiny bars are nickel-plated copper heat spreaders. VF display shows everything: RMS output, power supplies, temperatures, junction temps, all sorts of stuff. Protecting power devices is a computational problem, and the most accurate way to that is digitally. You *could* do the junction temp simulation with some diffamps and multipliers and such, but since I had a CPU here anyhow, it was a lot easier to do in code. John |
QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s
"Eeyore" wrote in
message John Larkin wrote: You're missing my point. If you can get twice the undistorted output by using a smarter protection circuit, it's still twice the output. How can you increase the allowable dissipation with a protection circuit ? Dissipation is determined by the audio signal and load impedance. Right, but if you can push the parts to higher powers without breaking them with a more intelligent protection circuit, then it is all good. The amplifier must function unimpeded for any valid combination of input level and output load. What does "unimpeded" mean for a huge input and a shorted load? A short isn't a valid load. A short is very real world. We long ago learned that audio amplfiiers that can't tolerate shorts tend to have short lives. |
QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s - Amp.jpg
amp.jpg
Schematic, please (c: Seriously, that's a beautiful piece of work, John. -- John English |
QSC RMX1450 schematic for a.a.p.l-s - Amp.jpg
On Thu, 05 Apr 2007 17:32:48 GMT, John E. wrote:
amp.jpg Schematic, please (c: Seriously, that's a beautiful piece of work, John. Each one of the 16 fet pairs has its own solid-state relay that can enable or disable that pair. So at powerup time, or on request, we ripple down the pairs and make sure each fet has the expected transconductance gain. The yellow things are fuses; if we ever blow a fet fuse, we know it. John |
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