Electronic – H-bridge – concern about mosfets

h-bridgemosfet

I want to create an H-bridge using MOSFETS (IRL620SPBF). I am trying to run a 6V motor which requires max current of 1.2A . The transistors Q111 and Q112 provide level conversion as the 'signal' comes from a Dev board at 3.3V. The DAC signal comes from the Dev board (0 – 3.3V). For prototyping purposes I created an oscillator from 555 timer to act in place of the DAC signal. The frequency ranges from 0 to 1.7KHz. The circuit works but I noticed a few drawbacks. Firstly, the mosfet Q1 gets really hot. These mosfets are rated at 5.2A, 200V which is well within my range. I do not understand why only Q1 gets hot and not Q4. Doesn't the current going through Q1 also goes through Q4 or is there something wrong with the circuit design or is it to do with the switching of the mosfet? I have provided the h-bridge circuit below:

enter image description here

Any comments and suggestions are welcome

EDITED

New development. Just noticed that when the motor is disconnected from the circuit and the power is connected, mosfet Q3 gets hot. Is this magic?

EDIT 18 March 2014 – Discussion

I took out mosfets Q1 and Q3 and directly connected them to 6V and sending PWM signals to FETS Q2 and Q4. I noticed that the fets get a little warm when driven the motor at full load but they do not get hot at all. When I was using the 4 FET h-bridge I noticed that the top fets would get really hot which was due to improper biasing (the fets weren't switching on fully). The new design is a great improvement. Now I am choosing an N-channel mosfet with much lower Rds(on) compared to the one I am using at the moment which will be STB80NF55L-06T4. Hope that would not consume too much power and dissipate heat. Thank you all

Best Answer

To turn on any of the MOSFETs properly in your circuit, the gate voltage has to be significantly higher than the source voltage. For the lower position devices Q2 and Q4, the sources are grounded to 0V therefore they can easily turn on into "saturation" by applying a gate voltage of a few volts above ground.

For the devices connected to the top rail, if you want the on-resistance between drain and source to be really low you have to obey the same rule - the drive voltage to the gate has to be several volts above the source. Now for low volt drop you want the source to be switched virtually to 6V - where in the circuit can the gate receive a voltage of maybe 9 or 10 volts?

There isn't one so please consider two options: -

  • Using P channel MOSFETs at the top rail, source to 6V. P MOS is slower than N MOS but in your application it won't make a difference (1.7kHz).
  • Using a drive circuit derived from a supply voltage that is at least 9V and quite possibly higher to get the best saturation from the MOSFETs.

Now the relays. What are you hoping to achieve here? The MOSFET whose gate is disconnected will float to some almost random voltage level and possibly turn on unexpectedly or just get hot. Get rid of the relays unless you have some cunning plan for their use which eludes me.

This is a standard H bridge using P and N MOSFETs: -

enter image description here

Please ask if you need recommendations for devices.