A while back I helped a student desgin the battery charger for the Cal Poly Solar Car Club. This used a bunch of step-up converters (one per PV panel) with the PIC generating the PWM to drive the FET. The PIC would watch the current driving the battery from each converter and adjust the pulse width driving the FET to maximize the current out of the converter and into the battery, loading the PV panel at its maximum power point. The use of separate converters for each panel allowed for varying illumination of the panels, since they surrounded the car. Some faced the sun, some did not. Harold On Tue, 27 Feb 2001 14:53:45 -0800 Robert Swirsky-Warner writes: > Folks: > > I've been considering designs for a PIC based Gel-Cell charger > (with > photovoltaic > power source.) I've been looking at the Maxim chips, but can't help > to think > that someone's done this before, and that with a PIC and a few A/D > channels > I can monitor voltage, temperature, battery charge (and run my > application > from the same PIC.) > > I searched the usual places, and turned up nothing. Anyone know of a > simple > design for a PIC-based Gel-Cell charger? I thought that PIC was a > major > supplier of chips for "smart" battery packs, but the app notes on > their > site seem like overkill for keeping a gel cell happy. > > -- > Robert Swirsky-Warner > Walt Disney Imagineering, R&D > > -- > http://www.piclist.com hint: The list server can filter out > subtopics > (like ads or off topics) for you. See http://www.piclist.com/#topics > > FCC Rules Online at http://hallikainen.com/FccRules Lighting control for theatre and television at http://www.dovesystems.com ________________________________________________________________ GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO! Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less! Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/tagj. -- http://www.piclist.com hint: The PICList is archived three different ways. See http://www.piclist.com/#archives for details.