Arduino Nano power supply

@fritigern

Posted by: @fritigern

Everyone,

According to-  https://www.arduino.cc/en/pmwiki.php?n=Main/ArduinoBoardNano,   Pin 30 can accept 6-20 Volts DC unregulated. The Spec Sheet I have shows capacitors, indicating this claim may not be completely misleading. See attachments.

NanoManual23.pdf

 

Has anybody successfully, or otherwise, used an unregulated supply to power their Arduino?

It also means one could run an Arduino off a car electrical system without a step down converter (with an appropriate resistor to protect it from car battery/alternator current). But car systems change voltage and have current spikes and falls when starting up and turning on/off thirsty peripherals. Has anybody had good or bad experience with Arduinos as car modifications?

Ta

Fritigern

 

That's interesting... it doesn't say that under the Technical Specs table, just says: "7 - 12" Volts input voltage, but I did a search and found that it does state a higher voltage as per your screen shot at the following link:

Arduino Nano

Perhaps a decent smoothing capacitor might also help to get rid of some nasty spikes.

Maybe just give it a go, and see if any magic smoke comes out of it 🙂

Cheers

Hi Fritigern,

If this project is to go in a car, I would put a 5volt regulator and 2 smoothing caps, and PLEASE put a in-line fuse in supply wiring, or you could loss more then your project!

Glen of London. 

@fritigern,  As Micro processors don't usually like unregulated power supplies, as this tends to induce noise into the system and creates havoc on the internal registers, and in particular the GPIO bus, and communication bus like the serial bus. Indeed, putting capacitors across the power supply helps to "smooth" out the some of the spikes in the voltage.. but this will not help in keeping the voltage stable enough for supplying current to the loads on your circuit.. remember, E=I X R.. As voltage varies, so will current if the resistance is constant.. Be very careful in using unregulated power to MPU's.. and do use a fuse in the supply line as @glen-of-london suggested.. The one thing about letting the "magic smoke" out is that it's a one time deal..and can get real expensive, real quick...lol

good luck on your project..

regards,

LouisR