Description
The PGCPSU was successfully backed on Kickstarter.
Getting into embedded electronics has never been as accessible and easy as nowadays, yet many things are still hit-and-miss, especially when going the cheap route. Even basics like choosing the right power supply for your latest battery-operated project can be super tricky.
With the Pretty Good Cheap Power Supply Unit, we’re solving that problem for you! PGCPSU is a three-in-one power supply board: it integrates a lithium battery charge management circuit with 5V and 3.3V DC-DC converter-based output rails to power most projects in a very compact form factor. We took special care in selecting inexpensive yet well-fitting parts to make up for a great little power(ful) supply!
What can I do with the PGCPSU?
The PGCPSU is perfect for all projects you plan to run off of a single rechargeable lithium battery.
With the PGCPSU we focused primarily on small size and good quiescent current figures, which in turn means it’s not really adequate for high power applications. You won’t – for example – be able to power a full-size Raspberry PI with the PGCPSU as it cannot supply enough current. A Raspberry PI Zero works on the other hand (we managed to run one for 17h on our awesome 2600mAh battery!).
All lower-power applications like Arduinos, BBC Micro:Bits (and many many other) will run just fine. You can actually manage to get really long run-times with such systems provided you take appropriate measures to reduce current draw (things like using sleep modes, bypassing cheap linear regulators, disabling useless power-on LEDs just to name a few)
Note on charging current
Make sure the lithium cell you’re using can take the selected charge current! Consult you batterie’s datasheet if you’re not sure about the maximum current it can handle.
As a rule of thumb, most cylindrical lithium cells can be charged at 1C (with C being the nominal capacity of the cell) safely. RC pouch cell often can take higher currents, but YMMV.
Here’s whats in the package:
- 1x PGCPSU DUO
Features
- no surprise: PGCPSU is fully specified
- 5V output rail providing at least (*) 350mA
- 3.3V rail providing at least (*) 400mA
- low quiescent current (35 – 90uA for the 5V rail + 40 – 75uA for the 3.3V rail)
- enable/disable pin for the 3.3V rail with selectable default state solder jumper
- micro USB input or pin header for charging (4.7V to 6V max.)
- high efficiency even at low load (important for great battery life!)
- small / tiny with only 25x20mm
- good line and load regulation
- JST PH 2 pin connector or solder terminals for the battery
- User adjustable charging rate (by cutting traces, see the datasheet below)
- quick charging at ~1866mA
- ~1400mA
- ~466mA
- integrated battery protection (including reverse polarity protection!)
- good fault tolerance and recovery behavior (over-discharge, short circuit/over-current etc…)
(*) you can draw the indicated current over the full range of the battery charge while still getting a clean output voltage, so we’re not talking about the usual best case “up to” rating (which would be up to 650mA on 5V and up to 800mA on 3.3V for our board). Due to the way the PGCPSU is built (have a look at the block diagram right below) you can’t draw the maximum current on both rails simultaneously however.
One more thing:
Our power supply modules are simply awesome because we design them carefully, with you in mind. We provide excellent datasheets so you don’t have to guess if it fits your application and generally don’t give “best case” specification figures. Instead we show rather conservative values of what is safely handled. Which means that if you were to push the boundaries, there should be a fair amount of headroom.
The PGCPSU is engineered and manufactured in Engen – Germany!
steve hole –
got this while out on kickstarter. I am very impressed with this small but mighty board, it ticks pretty much all boxes and is great for powering small micro based projects.
steve
Purchase not verified. Find out more