Also most of the older Golfcarts use series wound motors. An H-bridge controller is a waste of silicon with Series motors because reversing the current through the motor has no effect on the direction of rotation. In order to reverse a series wound motor you need to rewire the connection between the field and the armature (typically done with contactors).
A full H bridge would be good for the new E-tek motors though. But you'd have to come in at a really cheap price to pull customers away from the established manufacturers. Considering all of the extra (unnecessary?) bells and whistles that your controller will have this seems doubtful. Have you considered the battlebot/robot-wars crowd? Sounds like this controller would be ideal for them. >Most of the golf cart companies are switching to Separately excited motors. >The H bridge now only needs to pump out 10Amps or less to the field >and you have significantly less silicon in the H bridge. >The armature circuit on most low cost controls is anywhere from 225 to 275 >Amp >current limit. You can probably get by with 6 or less TO-220 MOSFETS and >4-6 Schottky diodes for the freewheel current. >The other advantage of the shunt system is it's relatively easy to regen >and you have a broader Torque-speed curve using an inexpensive control. > >Rod >hower.iwarp.com/photo.html > > > >Hi Everyone, > >I've been asked by a client of mine to design an electronic motor >controller >for some low-ish current (30A peak) 36 or 48 volt motors and I got to >thinking that I could probably design it so I can "add more silicon" and >get >it to the stage were it could drive golf carts, it would be a more useful >product. > >The problem is that I can't seem to find any specifications on what golf >cart motors consume.. I see that they run on between 36 and 48 volts, but >I've not seen any current specs. > >Can anyone point me at some reliable information on this? > >I'm looking at a Microprocessor controlled full H-Bridge system with a >serial interface for programming various parameters like accel and decel >rates, speed limits, and even be controllable from the serial port. It >would >"normally" be operated by a pot-box. It will support regen and be able to >limit it so that it doesn't "over charge" the battery pack..
