22.2V battery to power four 12V DC-motors

Hi!

I want to use a 22.2V (5000mAh) battery to supply power to four 12V DC-motors through the dual VNH5019 motor controller.
This will be done via PWM of an Arduino.

The questions is thus: Will I need to use some kind of DC-DC converter to regulate the voltage to the 12V used by the motors or should I just set the duty cycle of the PWM so 12V max will be used by the motors?

My personal guess (wrong as it may be) is that it’s not plausable to use a DC-DC converter since it would be subjected to a whole lot of current (5A per motor at stall current) as well as having to remove ~10V. I guess that would mean to much heat would have to be dissipated?

The motors I am using are: pololu.com/product/1447 and the battery is a 22.2V 5000mAh LiPo-battery.

Any advice as how to properly do this would be greatly appreciated!
- Olle

I would choose a different battery.

Hello, Olle.

Limiting the duty cycle will effectively lower the voltage supplied to the motor and will probably work. As you mentioned, there will be some losses if you use a voltage regulator to step-down the voltage. If you decide to use a regulator, you will probably want to use a switching regulator over a linear regulator to minimize loss. Unfortunately, we do not have any switching regulators that meet your power requirements.

- Jeremy

Thank you for the help!

And yes, I would ideally use a different battery, but since this battery is needed to power another istrument in the setup I figured it would be for the best to use it for the motors as well, since I don’t want to add unnecessary mass. :slight_smile: