(Topic ID: 119987)

Solenoid voltage

By snowvictim

9 years ago

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Latest reply 9 years ago by ForceFlow
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Hi, folks!

I'll be building an SS pinball machine soon. Nothing fancy at first, I just want to get my head around the overall design and setup before I try anything even closely related to EM. I have a few questions about pinball solenoids.

a) Do pinball solenoids have uniform voltage inputs? Some are high power, some are low power - I was wondering whether this relates to voltage differences or operating differences i.e. flipper solenoids operate on a 4 step basis - big voltage for shoot, smaller voltage for keeping the flipper up.

b) If so, what is the standard voltage input for a solenoid (say a flipper solenoid since I'll be starting by mounting my flipper assemblies on whitewood)? I hooked a knocker solenoid to a 18V supply (2x 9V in series) - I wasn't expecting it to fire as I know that the minimum voltage on pinball solenoids is 24V, I was just tinkering. It jerked a bit, but no significant movement.

And a bonus question to anyone who's into electronics (it's about MOSFETs).

I've got a MOSFET for my Arduino to power a 5-36V solenoid. Thing is, it's not working (I don't know fully why, although I do have my suspicions):

a) How do I tell if I've got a N-Channel MOSFET or a P-Channel MOSFET. I downloaded the documentation, but it doesn't specify which type my MOSFET is...

b) VGS is 16V for the MOSFET. I'm hitting it with 18V so technically it should work, but I don't have a diode for my circuit. Is the diode necessary? I popped an LED in but it burned (ooooh, surprise...) since I don't want a backcurrent.

Usually, for solid state models, ~50V is used to fire the flipper and a lower ~20V is used to hold it.
I believe that first you should check the specs, have a diagram, understand what are you doing and then order whatever spare parts are necessary.
You can use schematics from any pinball machine you want and recreate the particular circuit that you need.

P CHANNEL MOSFET. (Load connected between Drain and Ground)

When the PIC output is LOW, the transistor is OFF and the gate of the P MOSFET is HIGH (12V). This means the P MOSFET is OFF.

When the output of the PIC is HIGH, the transistor is turned ON and pulls the gate of the MOSFET LOW. This turns the MOSFET ON and current will flow through the load.

N CHANNEL MOSFET.(Load connected between Drain and +12V)

When the PIC output is LOW, the transistor is OFF and the gate of the P MOSFET is HIGH (12V). This means the N MOSFET is ON and current will flow through the load.

When the output of the PIC is HIGH, the transistor is turned ON and pulls the gate of the MOSFET LOW. This turns the MOSFET OFF.

Thats a copy-paste explanation. Im too lazy to rave on MOSFET theory at 1am.

MOSFET should be ordered according to nominal voltage. 12V is just an example.

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