“While its output voltage is nominally 24V, adjustment using its 4pin PMBus allows this to be set from 16 to 26.4V, but it can be further adjusted down to 0V if needed,” according to the company. “This wide adjustment range makes it useful to support battery management used in remote radio base station installations, for example, as well as other applications where conversion from 48V to 24V is necessary at high power levels.”
Electronics Weekly has asked how the converter is adjusted to between 16V and 0V – it is not obvious from the data sheet.
Flex replies: While the device is characterised for the purposes of the Technical Specification from 16V to 26.4V on the output, it is possible to adjust the output all the way down to zero using the PMBus commands via the digital interface. In fact, all of our digital IBC’s have this capability, but we have chosen to highlight this specific capability in this particular instance since the output voltage of the device lends itself well to battery management applications where the ability to modify the output over such a wide range could be particularly beneficial.
The converter measures ~58 x 37 x 14mm and is 97.1% efficient (54Vin half-load). No load power is 9.3W, which disables to 1.2W.
Operation is across -40 to +125°C, and heatsinking is required, with derating caveats dependant on heatsink size and airflow.
Basic input-output isolation is 1.5kV for compliance with IEC/EN/UL 62368-1.
Protections include over-temperature, input under-voltage, output over-voltage, over-current and short circuit. For fault diagnosis, a black box event recorder is provided to capture data at the time of fault occurrence.
Switching is typically at 180kHz, and synchronisation near this is possible.
An additional input filter is needed to meet Class B in EN 55022 / EN 55032, CISPR 22 / CISPR 32 and FCC part 15J – the data sheet suggests something suitable.
For remote configuration, control, and monitoring, ‘Flex Power Designer’ software is available.
