Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

sam am I

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I thought I had saw somewhere them in use but,........ Anyone currently using them? If so, could you share where you purchased them?

Thx
 

wired247

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

DC to DC SCR's arent the most reliable relays.
 

sam am I

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

Hmmmmm, was thinking more down the MOSFET road.......

I'll spare you the theory but, MOSFET's make much better switches, their Ron(resistance when turned on is like 0.005Ω's for example). This is allowing them(more and more these days) to switch higher currents and dissipate very little heat(the killing factor) due to such low Ron.

They are approaching the perfect relay/solenoid ..no moving parts to wear out, no contact bounce, no welded/pitting contacts, no contact resistance(micro Ω's), no switching current(micro amps).

We're riding in elevators(among many other things) these days that once used relays/solenoids that now are using SSR's......my motor needs them!!

I'll be spec'ing some in sounds but they'll be a bit more $$$ over solenoids, but over the years I think I've repalced 3 sets of solenoids cuz they would get flaky or flat out stop working
 
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wired247

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

I'm well aware of how a MOSFET works but there is a reason they arent used in industrial applications much for somewhat high amperage low voltage DC current. They are expensive and they don't last. I buy a lot of relays and relatively few are solid state DC. Its even hard to find them if you do want them. AC sure... not a problem. DC have a real tendency to lock up when energized.
 

sam am I

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

Ahhh, K np, just didn't know that SCR's were even considered/used here. Hadn't heard of them used here. Just figured if offered, they'd be MOSFETS here over SCR's for much lower resistance reason and.......

Inherently, SCR's running DC will stay on once turned on but, MOSFET don't.....enless they smoke of course.
 
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wired247

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

I use a lot of SCR 's or at least I buy a lot. I lump most all solid state relays together. MOSFETS are hardly ever used in industrial high current DC applications and you really have to look for them if you do want to use them . Low current use they are OK enough on PLC cards as log as they are backed up by standard magnetic contactors. Even the ones that are supposed to be rated for 5 amps or more have very limited lifespans.

Sam. I assume you came out of the nuclear Navy. You know why. Out here in the real world almost nothing is milspec unless you want to spend $300 on a relay that will live under the load that a trim motor will put on it.
 

sam am I

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

Lmao....Nah, sounds as if we just come from a different "real" worlds I suppose Wired. No nukes here,...well sorta but, just R & D mainly. Been designing with MOSFET's as switches and such since back in the day though when they came about......Industrial, military and consumer and yes, out in the real world even. It's all the same beast at the end of the day wired.

Done it all man and it sounds like you've had horrible luck with the designs your using? 5 amp DC-DC SSR's are dying on you? For crap sakes, my 1990 Honda uses a 5 or 10 amp OPTO ISO DC-DC SSR I put in there in the mid 90's to run an amp and is still working!! Something definitely wrong with that design man!!

No need for milspec here though, that's just extra cost for tighter tolerances, I can live with a 5%, 10% part on my boat. I'm cheap like that :D

BTW, Nice boat!!

I found some $26/ea. 3.5mΩ, 100 amp continuous, 240 Amp surge DC-DC MOSFET SSR's, Gonna give'er hell and live a little on the wild side eh? Best case? I get to give the mechanical contact man the finger at roughly the cost of a mechanical!! Worst? I get to use a screw driver to trim, again at some point down the road:facepalm:.......That's getting tougher for this old dude hanging over the motor out in the lake.

This appears to works on paper though, I'm pretty confident they will out last mechanical's given my experience and where technology has brought these things over the years AND, I have one hell of a heat sink:lol:
 
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wired247

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

I work as a engineering manager and have worked in a controls setting for 25 years or so. Has it been that long? Damn I'm old. In any case the greatest failures I've seen with DC to DC SSR's is when they drive solenoids. Even with a shunt that surge back from the magnetized coil wipes them out. I won't let any of the engineers or electricians I supervise design, buy, or install any control set that activates a solenoid directly off a cards built in SSR. Rule of thumb is if it activates a solenoid, it must run through isolation contactor. The worst are Allen Bradley 1000's. Theyre everywhere and have no replaceable SSR's. When one SSR dies you can usually get a little more life out of it by reprogramming PLC to redirect the output if you have an extra but we used to change one out at least every 2-3 months as the SSR's would crap out driving air solenoids every few seconds. We had 60 or so in service at a Frito Lay plant I worked at and I had isolation relays installed in all of them. Never changed another PLC after that. Speaking of Opto's, everything in that place was 24 VDC control circuit driven and those freakin' Optos gave everyone fits. UL code doesnt require it and its really outside the scope of the NEC but it is required to isolate CE spec equipment. I do like the 24 VDC stuff as it is pretty much intrinsically safe but I'm not about to change out any of the 110 control circuit non isolated legacy controls I have in the plants I supervise now. That stuff never dies.
 
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sam am I

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

DC to DC SSR's is when they drive solenoids. Even with a shunt that surge back from the magnetized coil wipes them out.

Yes, inductive loads such as motors(my case) and coils on relay's and the like are definitely a factor, no doubt, The "flyback" pulse seen when you de-energizer those relay/solenoid coils by whatever devices is driving the coil, is arcing in air gaps/contacts with mechanical's, they can stand up to this as they just pit but, in time, as you know, they stop working too as the contacts waste away.........Typically though, diode suppression is enough to eliminate/reduce this pulse. This is the "shunt" you mentioned?

If not, generally, placing the diode/s directly across these driven DC coils, if not as close to as possible to clamp the flyback pulse works well. The driving device, be it another switch or SSR, transistor or what have you, should also have a clamping diode placed across it's contacts(Drain, Collector, etc) to ground to additionally to eliminate/reduce arcing at the air gag or destroying the SSR/transistors due to exceeding their reverse voltage maximums.

Well......Sounds to me you tend to "modify" things and experiment with "outside" the norms? Some ya win some ya loose, right? I might be on new ground here but, knowing somewhat the nature of the beast helps in all cases as I think we have.

When the risk is low'ish and the gain is high'ish.....what the heck!!!
 
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racerone

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

Are these bits you are talking about for outboard motors or the space ship to mars.
 

wired247

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

Yes, inductive loads such as motors(my case) and coils on relay's and the like are definitely a factor, no doubt, The "flyback" pulse seen when you de-energizer those relay/solenoid coils by whatever devices is driving the coil, is arcing in air gaps/contacts with mechanical's, they can stand up to this as they just pit but, in time, as you know, they stop working too as the contacts waste away.........Typically though, diode suppression is enough to eliminate/reduce this pulse. This is the "shunt" you mentioned?

If not, generally, placing the diode/s directly across these driven DC coils, if not as close to as possible to clamp the flyback pulse works well. The driving device, be it another switch or SSR, transistor or what have you, should also have a clamping diode placed across it's contacts(Drain, Collector, etc) to ground to additionally to eliminate/reduce arcing at the air gag or destroying the SSR/transistors due to exceeding their reverse voltage maximums.

Well......Sounds to me you tend to "modify" things and experiment with "outside" the norms? Some ya win some ya loose, right? I might be on new ground here but, knowing somewhat the nature of the beast helps in all cases as I think we have.

When the risk is low'ish and the gain is high'ish.....what the heck!!!


The relays are $10 and a lot easier to diagnose and much easier to change out than PLC cards. Even with the diode that is "supposed" to stop the arcing on the mechanical relays they still take a beating over time.
 

sam am I

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

Are these bits you are talking about for outboard motors or the space ship to mars.

:noidea:

Hmmmmm, well yes, electronic switches could be right up there with discovering gravity, penicillin and rotary phones too, so I suppose a space ship to mars comes to mind :facepalm:

BTW, Is your electronic ignition running Leeches and Newts or is it mainly of Romulan design?
 
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gm280

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

Being An Engineering Technician for my career (since retired after 38 plus years - being into electronics since I could hold a soldering iron) I know very well what newer MOSFETs are capable of doing. Their latest ON resistance is simply amazing, and I may add, a lot lower then any relay contact will ever come close too. And for the record, many high powered equipment have been using solid state relays for years now. They are not something new or earth shattering. I've seen them used in three phase power equipment that literally never needed replaced. And a lot of the latest high current MOSFETs coming on the market now have built in protection diodes just for motor usage and back EMF surges. They are even marketed for those exact usages... JMTC
 

sam am I

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

No doubt......Well, tweeking compression ratios, pistons, bores, milling, porting, jetting and the like for higher performance is more a visual, touch and feel thing that tends to go over a bit easier but, sometimes what you can't see, touch, feel or understand per se, it's taboo to even think "tweek" for some. Sure people "chip" blindly for performance but, when someone mentions the actual components involved or the algorithms used, or wants more throughput or higher res A/D's.....people cough, spit and run!! Status quo sometimes prevails here, especially in retro'ing in these "black magic" area's at component levels. Wrenches are just easier to use than data sheets, calculus and o-scopes gm. Simple cold hard fact

Thing is.....Merc, Johnny and ALL of industry in general have been in using MOS transistors in their capacitor discharge ignitions, coil switching circuity, voltage regulars and the like for many many trouble free years, waaaaaaaay more predictable and huge life span as compared to the old mechanical ig's and voltage reg's!! But, most people aren't even aware of that specific technology? And why would they need to be? They can't/don't need to see it, they can't feel it or even open it up to adjust it or even file it. It works well and never breaks, they go with it.

Speaking of "filing on", It wasn't too long ago back in the days of old that the scary but mighty transistor was installed in the first electronic ignitions to replace those arcing, sparking, burning points we so loved to file on. You know as well as I, 99.9% of people said "nahhhhhhhh, never will work, not reliable "

It hasn't been until resenly(last few years) though these FET's have reached this incredibly low Ron level that it is now. I predict soon though OB manufactures(I think Yamaha is already, i could be a little late ot flat wrong, I don't have access to all their design info) will soon be using these new gen MOSFET's in the trim/tilt area more and more, it just makes sense. Aerospace is....those Boeings and McDoug's we jump in and whisp off in everyday are, in this exact area! They out preform mechanical systems hands down just like they are in electronic ignitions currently.

And here we are again......We have a new gen of transistors that are just as reliable, power supply in pace maker reliable, fly people around the world reliable BUT, just like anything else, they have limitations, understanding and designing within the limiting parameters is critical, knowing what makes them fail is critical and if there is ways to prevent/limit and manage these typical failures is imperative.

The body of this little transistor is roughly the diameter of your index finger nail and yes!! The data sheet is right, those are amps @ 100C!!! The pulsed current is 1530 amps!! The metal leads will first melt away due to heat from current flow before the silicon switch inside fails. $4.65/ea. They can be paralleled which then doubles,triples etc the current as they would share current in the given path and/or for redundancy. I'm using two for each relay mounted on the existing plate for a heat sink........as i said, works on paper and I might just be crazy thinking but, I don't think so and I think it's time to get ride of those old POS relays I have to keep buying.

FET.jpg
 
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wired247

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

Add water to the mix. And switchboxes run on AC They are quite reliable but in the world of solid state relays there is the world of difference between relays running on AC and relays running on DC. Mercury uses DC SSR's in their ECU's but they are fully potted and when they go out its big money to repair or replace them. For something that doesnt NEED a DC SSR in a wet environment I'll stick with good old reliable and cheap mechanical relays.
 
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sam am I

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

Lol, the dies are hermetically sealed wired, no need to pot squat, just mainly hook up wires like we use now. My relays have always just used a ****ty rubber gasket and have oxidize as well as pitted and welded :rolleyes:. And AC is just faster DC:D.......:facepalm: Switch boxes are creating DC from the AC too! They are rectifying.

But I'm not wanting to change how you think or what you use.....don't get me wrong, by all means, stick with what works for you man!!
 
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wired247

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

Lol, the dies are hermetically sealed wired. My relays have always just used a ****ty rubber gasket and have oxidize as well as pitted and welded :rolleyes:. And AC is just moving DC.......:facepalm: Switch boxes are creating DC from the AC too! They are rectifying.

But I'm not wanting to change how you think or what you use.....don't get me wrong, by all means, stick with what works for you man!!

Lets not resort to using mocking emoticons. Its very childish.

As poorly sealed as those trim relays are , they keep on working. I even use those very same poorly sealed robust relays to drive the 15 amps worth of juice my fuel injection pump (s) use as the factory fully potted DC SSR's in the ECU that power the VST's factory injection pump have proven themselves to be unreliable. Its a common fix to just wire around the ECU's VST pump control relay ( Mercury calls them "drivers" ) and tie it to the ignition circuit with a mechanical relay so that its on all the time the ignition circuit is energized as the repair bill for one is $1200.
 
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gm280

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

wired247, off subject, but I really like the boat in your picture. I'm assuming it is yours. how fast does it move? Looks like it would move along quite nicely from the slick lines...
 

sam am I

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

No mocking here, just keeping it light hearted , sorry if it offended you.
 

wired247

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Re: Solid State Relay's for Trim/Tilt System.

wired247, off subject, but I really like the boat in your picture. I'm assuming it is yours. how fast does it move? Looks like it would move along quite nicely from the slick lines...


Why thank you. Had it since 1981 or at least since I went down to the dealer with my dad when I was 15 and we picked it out. Had a Johnson 90 on it then and Ive skied a million miles behind that boat and towed it probably 10 million. Fastest Ive had it is 86 MPH. Its got a few left in it. I just bought a Brucato ACU for the injection system and installed a 225 pro max spec powerhead. Should be in the 90's this summer with the right prop.

I have been contemplating buying a fast hull next year. Something like a 110 MPH SVT or a Allison Grand Sport. Then pulling the motor and cotrols, steering etc from my Checkmate and selling the hull but I don't know if I can bring myself to do it. Might just have to buy a pre rigged fast boat or maybe build another sane motor for the checkmate and letting the kids use it. Lots of months to go until next years bonus.
 
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