Variable Voltage Power Supply
The LM317T is an adjustable 3-terminal positive voltage regulator capable of supplying different DC voltage outputs other than the fixed voltage power supply of +5 or +12 volts, or as a variable output voltage from a few volts up to some maximum value all with currents of about 1.5 amperes.
With the aid of a small bit of additional circuitry added to the output of the PSU we can have a bench power supply capable of a range of fixed or variable voltages either positive or negative in nature. In fact this is more simple than you may think as the transformer, rectification and smoothing has already been done by the PSU beforehand all we need to do is connect our additional circuit to the +12 volt yellow wire output. But firstly, lets consider a fixed voltage output.
Then we can use 3-terminal voltage regulators and a suitable Zener diode to produce a variety of fixed output voltages from our previous bench power supply ranging from +5V up to +12V. But we can improve on this design by replacing the fixed voltage regulator with a variable voltage regulator such as the LM317T.
Variable Voltage Power Supply
The LM317T is a fully adjustable 3-terminal positive voltage regulator capable of supplying 1.5 amps with an output voltage ranging from around 1.25 volts to just over 30 volts. By using the ratio of two resistances, one of a fixed value and the other variable (or both fixed), we can set the output voltage to the desired level with a corresponding input voltage being anywhere between 3 and 40 volts.
The LM317T variable voltage regulator also has built in current limiting and thermal shut down capabilities which makes it short-circuit proof and ideal for any low voltage or home made bench power supply.
The output voltage of the LM317T is determined by ratio of the two feedback resistors R1and R2 which form a potential divider network across the output terminal as shown below.
LM317T Variable Voltage Regulator
The voltage across the feedback resistor R1 is a constant 1.25V reference voltage, Vrefproduced between the “output” and “adjustment” terminal. The adjustment terminal current is a constant current of 100uA. Since the reference voltage across resistor R1 is constant, a constant current i will flow through the other resistor R2, resulting in an output voltage of:
Then whatever current flows through resistor R1 also flows through resistor R2(ignoring the very small adjustment terminal current), with the sum of the voltage drops across R1 and R2 being equal to the output voltage, Vout. Obviously the input voltage, Vin must be at least 2.5 volts greater than the required output voltage to power the regulator.
Also, the LM317T has very good load regulation providing that the minimum load current is greater than 10mA. So to maintain a constant reference voltage of 1.25V, the minimum value of feedback resistor R1 needs to be 1.25V/10mA = 120 Ohm and this value can range anywhere from 120 ohms to 1,000 ohms with typical values of R1 being about 220Ω’s to 240Ω’s for good stability.
If we know the value of the required output voltage, Vout and the feedback resistor R1 is say 240 ohms, then we can calculate the value of resistor R2 from the above equation. For example, our original output voltage of 9V would give a resistive value for R2 of:
R1.((Vout/1.25)-1) = 240.((9/1.25)-1) = 1,488 Ohms
or 1,500 Ohms (1k5Ω) to the nearest preferred value.
Of course in practice, resistors R1 and R2 would normally be replaced by a potentiometer so as to produce a variable voltage power supply, or by several switched preset resistances if several fixed output voltages are required.
But in order to reduce the math’s required in calculating the value of resistor R2 every time we want a particular voltage we can use standard resistance tables as shown below which gives us the regulators output voltage for different ratios of resistors R1 and R2using E24 resistance values.
Ratio of Resistances R1 to R2
| R2 Value | Resistor R1 Value | ||||||||
| 150 | 180 | 220 | 240 | 270 | 330 | 370 | 390 | 470 | |
| 100 | 2.08 | 1.94 | 1.82 | 1.77 | 1.71 | 1.63 | 1.59 | 1.57 | 1.52 |
| 120 | 2.25 | 2.08 | 1.93 | 1.88 | 1.81 | 1.70 | 1.66 | 1.63 | 1.57 |
| 150 | 2.50 | 2.29 | 2.10 | 2.03 | 1.94 | 1.82 | 1.76 | 1.73 | 1.65 |
| 180 | 2.75 | 2.50 | 2.27 | 2.19 | 2.08 | 1.93 | 1.86 | 1.83 | 1.73 |
| 220 | 3.08 | 2.78 | 2.50 | 2.40 | 2.27 | 2.08 | 1.99 | 1.96 | 1.84 |
| 240 | 3.25 | 2.92 | 2.61 | 2.50 | 2.36 | 2.16 | 2.06 | 2.02 | 1.89 |
| 270 | 3.50 | 3.13 | 2.78 | 2.66 | 2.50 | 2.27 | 2.16 | 2.12 | 1.97 |
| 330 | 4.00 | 3.54 | 3.13 | 2.97 | 2.78 | 2.50 | 2.36 | 2.31 | 2.13 |
| 370 | 4.33 | 3.82 | 3.35 | 3.18 | 2.96 | 2.65 | 2.50 | 2.44 | 2.23 |
| 390 | 4.50 | 3.96 | 3.47 | 3.28 | 3.06 | 2.73 | 2.57 | 2.50 | 2.29 |
| 470 | 5.17 | 4.51 | 3.92 | 3.70 | 3.43 | 3.03 | 2.84 | 2.76 | 2.50 |
| 560 | 5.92 | 5.14 | 4.43 | 4.17 | 3.84 | 3.37 | 3.14 | 3.04 | 2.74 |
| 680 | 6.92 | 5.97 | 5.11 | 4.79 | 4.40 | 3.83 | 3.55 | 3.43 | 3.06 |
| 820 | 8.08 | 6.94 | 5.91 | 5.52 | 5.05 | 4.36 | 4.02 | 3.88 | 3.43 |
| 1000 | 9.58 | 8.19 | 6.93 | 6.46 | 5.88 | 5.04 | 4.63 | 4.46 | 3.91 |
| 1200 | 11.25 | 9.58 | 8.07 | 7.50 | 6.81 | 5.80 | 5.30 | 5.10 | 4.44 |
| 1500 | 13.75 | 11.67 | 9.77 | 9.06 | 8.19 | 6.93 | 6.32 | 6.06 | 5.24 |
By changing resistor R2 for a 2k ohm potentiometer we can control the output voltage range of our PSU bench power supply from about 1.25 volts to a maximum output voltage of 10.75 (12-1.25) volts. Then our final modified variable power supply circuit is shown below.
Variable Voltage Power Supply Circuit
We can improve our basic voltage regulator circuit a little more by connecting an Ammeter and a Voltmeter to the output terminals. These instruments will give a visual indication of both the current and voltage output from the variable voltage regulator. A fast-acting fuse can also be incorporated if desired in the design to provide additional short circuit protection as shown.
Disadvantages of the LM317T
One of the main disadvantages of using the LM317T as part of a variable voltage power supply circuit to regulate a voltage is that as much as 2.5 volts is dropped or lost as heat across the regulator. So for example, if the required output voltage is to be +9 volts, then the input voltage will need to be as much as 12 volts or more if the output voltage is to remain stable under maximum load conditions. This voltage drop across the regulator is called “dropout”. Also due to this dropout voltage some form of heatsinking is required to keep the regulator cool.
Fortunately low dropout variable voltage regulators are available such as the National Semiconductor “LM2941T” Low Dropout variable voltage regulator which has a low dropout voltage of just 0.9 volts at maximum load. This low dropout comes at a cost as this device is only capable of delivering 1.0 amp with a variable voltage output from 5 to 20 volts. However, we can use this device to give an output voltage of about 11.1V, just a little lower than the input voltage.
So to summarise, our bench power supply that we made from an old PC power supply unit in a previous tutorial can be converted to provide a variable voltage power supply by using a LM317T to regulate the voltage. By connecting the input of this device across the +12V yellow output wire of the PSU we can have both fixed +5V, +12V and a variable output voltage ranging from about 2 to 10 volts at a maximum output current of 1.5A.