Is this able to act like the R78E 5v switching voltage regulator?

Hi! I was wondering, is this part easy for a novice to use? Is there a comprehensive guide to show how to use it? Also, would I need to buy any additional parts in order to boost the voltage of 4 AA's to 12v?

I'd also agree with the skill levels being wrong... no programming required, and the prototyping skill level should be higher as there's some long math equations involved. Plus you could (potentially) be dealing with dangerous voltages and currents.

More helpful then the datasheet would be this document
http://www.onsemi.com/pub/Collateral/AN920-D.PDF
which explains the theory of operation, and also has the mathematical equations to calculate the necessary component values for any desired output voltage.

What a great little chip. With ~5 external passive components, you can make a switched-mode power supply that will give you lower, higher or opposite polarity DC from DC input. You can also use an external power transistor to deliver way more than the ~500ma the chip alone will supply (I'm currently using it in this configuration to power a ~3a 5v load from a 20v rechargeable battery pack.)
Not to mention that unlike a linear regulator, you can power loads over a hundred mA or so without burning yourself or having a completely ridiculous heatsink.
Best design resource I found was http://www.nomad.ee/micros/mc34063a/index.shtml... it's a javascript calculator for the component values in the basic circuits presented in the datasheet given your application parameters (VIN, VOUT, IOUTmax, etc.)

Ignore my last comment on this part. I've got a better idea.

I'm going to make a switching power supply that plugs into the mains, but I need some help:

• This IC can't be wired straight to the mains, because its maximum supply voltage is 40 volts. But what if I wire it up like this? Would that work?

  bridge rectifier -- resistor¹ -- 400V cap² -- zener diode -- 16V cap³ -- MC34063

basically, a transformerless power supply, for low currents it should work

¹ To limit inrush current while the capacitor charges up. What would be a good value to use? 10 ohms? 22? 47? 100?

² In my country we have 220V mains, so I can't just use a 200V capacitor. Actually I think any capacitor rated for 330V or higher would be ok, but you never know, one of these days I could get a voltage spike and, after taking everything apart, a blast of blue smoke.

³ I will actually use a cap rated for at least twice the zener diode's voltage. So obviously I won't use a 16V cap and a 12V zener.

• If I use an external MOSFET, can I connect it to the MC34063 and switch (already rectified and filtered) mains electricity? If so, can you recommend a part number for a MOSFET that can handle 400V?

Sorry for the long comment. Please answer as soon as possible. I don't need this for next week or anything like that, but the sooner the better.

Thank you.

This little guy is pretty epic. Im using a few of these to power Vintage Nixie tube projects from 12v. For those unfamiliar Nixie tubes are old Neon displays used before Leds and LCD where invented. To get one to light you need over 100-180v of power to "fire" and then feed them a few milliamps to keep them running. This little fella in step-up setup can deliver power up to the required voltages and supply my project with a few dozen milliamps making it a very cost-effective way to get a high-voltage supply.

So don't dismiss these little regulators. they can do some pretty amazing things. Oh and if clueless about calculating the right values there are multiple calculators around on the internet to help. naturally i'd advise to use those as guidelines and to try and check their accuracy.

Also anyone else noticing the wrong skill checklist? this clearly requires experienced prototyping and doesn't require any coding.

Let's say I'm building a Mintyboost-like portable charger. As you probably know, the output on the original circuit is limited to 500mA. If I use this IC and the 6Ah pack you sell, how much current would I be able to draw? The IC is limited to 1.5 amps (1.8-2.6 amps from the battery, depending on its charge level, plus a bit more due to power losses) but I feel like the protection circuit on the battery will not let me draw that much...

I was looking into using this switching regulator for 5V --> 3.3V step-down for an XBee but was told by Digi that switching frequencies below 500kHz might interfere with the XBee. Does anyone know if that is true or not?

I can use it for Step up 1.2v to 5v?

Hi everybody, I'm looking for some help using this IC as a step up switching regulator with the following specs:

Vin = 3.60 V Vout = 5.00 V Iout = 300.00 A Vripple = 0.10 V Vin min = 3.24 V Ct = 165.00 pF Ipk = .60 A Rsc = 0.00 Ω Lmin = 0.01 µH (using 390UH) Co = 198,367.35 µF (using 2000UF) R1 = 1.00 kΩ R2 = ((Vout - 1.25) / 1.25) * R1 = 3.00 kΩ

Under no load I get a perfect 5V on the output. However when under a .3A load the output voltage drops to 2.5~3.0 Volts.

Anybody have any idea's what i'm doing wrong? I'm trying to use this chip to step up the voltage on a 3.6volt LIPOLY battery to 5 volts.

Thanks for any help.

I'm choosing between this and lt1303 form digikey: http://www.digikey.sg/product-detail/en/LT1303CN8%23PBF/LT1303CN8%23PBF-ND/889063. which do you think would give more amps with the same configuration?

Can anyone tell me maximum output voltage of this thing? Right now I'm using a TL499a to stepup 6v to about 26v at 10mA... would this chip be able to do the same job? I've looked thru the datasheet and the application note and I can't find this info anywhere, what am I missing?

I've used the online calculator available here: http://www.bobtech.ro/mc34063a-online-calculator
there is also a very comprehensive video tutorial about MC34063A. I've used this as a current mode power supply for 4 HB LEDs.

Btw, for a guy relearnig his HS electronics after 30 years, what is Vripple and Fmin?
thx again,
Barry

Will this chip let me step up 5V input from a USB jack to 12.6V that I need to have to charge 3 LI cells in series? I know its not ideal but need to be able to show as proof of concept
Tia,
Barry

Ideally, if I put in 10V at 1A max, can I get 5V at 500mA max, and vice versa?

Will this chip work at 2.4v input? I want to power an ATmega328 with 2 x 1.2v AA batteries.

SparkFun should sell switching regulator modules that are pin-for-pin replacements for 780x series linear regulators, like this, but cheaper: http://www.dimensionengineering.com/de-sw050.htm

Could I use this to power an ATTiny with 1.5V OR 9V?
EDIT: Never you mind, I'm going to power it with a definite 3V (coin battery).
EDIT: You may mind again... although I don't need an answer anymore.
EDIT: Never mind again, this is not suitable for my purposes.

So I just built a circuit using one of these to step up voltage from 3.3V to 5V (one of the sensors I am using is 5V while the Arduino Pro is 3.3).
It is almost working, but when I supply power from the Arduino board the voltage (on the arduino line) fluctuates from 3.3 V to around 2.5 V, constantly, and the output voltage is not stable either. I'm not sure what I did wrong here...I used the javascript calculator posted above with the following values:
Vin: 3.3
Vout: 5
Iout: 16.5
Vripple: 0.25 mV
Fmin: 43 kHz
I was given the following values:
Ct: 444 pF (used 2 220 pF in parallel)
Rsc: 4.752 Ohm (used 2 10 Ohm in parallel)
Lmin: 404 uH (used 400 uH)
Co: 6593 uF (Believe this is a calculation error; used 1000 uF)
R: 180 Ohm (used 180)
R1: 1k
R2: 3k
I used a 1N5819 diode and a 180 uF input capacitor.
Any ideas what could be wrong? Why is the supply voltage fluctuating so much?
EDIT: Nevermind...check your circuits! I had one of the grounds connected to pin 3 rather than pin 4.

Hey, i see in the Sparkfun eagle library there is a 34063 SMD part, but no PTH. Is this part an SMD?
Thanks

Of the two I just got form Sparkfun, the markings say:
ST CHN
063EC
KK2736
I assume these are the correct ICs - why was the MC34 -part left off?

un1tz3r0:
Thanks for that link. That was really helpful for getting the components right. Far easier than dealing with the math myself. :) I did spot check it, but it worked fine. I built it, and my first switching regulator works great. 14V to 3.3V step down, now on to the XBee modules.. :)