LMH6321
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SNOSAL8C –APRIL 2006–REVISED MARCH 2013
BANDWIDTH AND STABILITY
As can be seen in the schematic of Figure 52, a small capacitor is inserted in parallel with the series input
resistors. The reason for this is to compensate for the natural band-limiting effect of the 1st order filter formed by
this resistor and the input capacitance of the buffer. With a typical CIN of 3.5 pF (Figure 52), a pole is created at
fp2 = 1/(2πR1CIN) = 4.5 MHz (1)
This will band-limit the buffer and produce further phase lag. If used in an op amp-loop application with an
amplifier that has the same order of magnitude of unity gain crossing as fp2, this additional phase lag will
produce oscillation.
The solution is to add a small feed-forward capacitor (phase lead) around the input resistor, as shown in
Figure 52. The value of this capacitor is not critical but should be such that the time constant formed by it and the
input resistor that it is in parallel with (RIN) be at least five times the time constant of RINCIN. Therefore,
C1= (5RIN/R1)(CIN) (2)
from Electrical Characteristics, RIN is 250 kΩ.
In the case of the example in Figure 52, RINCIN produces a time-constant of 870 ns, so C1should be chosen to
be a minimum of 4.4 μs, or 438 pF. The value of C1(1000 pF) shown in Figure 52 gives 10 μs.
OUTPUT CURRENT AND SHORT CIRCUIT PROTECTION
The LMH6321 is designed to deliver a maximum continuous output current of 300 mA. However, the maximum
available current, set by internal circuitry, is about 700 mA at room temperature. The output current is
programmable up to 300 mA by a single external resistor and voltage source.
The LMH6321 is not designed to safely output 700 mA continuously and should not be used this way. However,
the available maximum continuous current will likely be limited by the particular application and by the package
type chosen, which together set the thermal conditions for the buffer (see THERMAL MANAGEMENT) and could
require less than 300 mA.
The programming of both the sourcing and sinking currents into the load is accomplished with a single resistor.
Figure 53 shows a simplified diagram of the V to I converter and ISC protection circuitry that, together, perform
this task.
Referring to Figure 53, the two simplified functional blocks, labeled V/I Converter and Short Circuit Protection,
comprise the circuitry of the Current Limit Control.
The V/I converter consists of error amplifier A1 driving two PNP transistors in a Darlington configuration. The two
input connections to this amplifier are VCL (inverting input) and GND (non-inverting input). If GND is connected to
zero volts, then the high open loop gain of A1, as well as the feedback through the Darlington, will force CL, and
thus one end REXT to be at zero volts also. Therefore, a voltage applied to the other end of REXT will force a
current
IEXT = VPROG/REXT (3)
into this pin. Via this pin, IOUT is programmable from 10 mA to 300 mA by setting IEXT from 25 μA to 750 µA by
means of a fixed REXT of 10 kΩand making VCL variable from 0.25V to 7.5V. Thus, an input voltage VCL is
converted to a current IEXT. This current is the output from the V/I converter. It is gained up by a factor of two and
sent to the Short Circuit Protection block as IPROG. IPROG sets a voltage drop across RSC which is applied to the
non-inverting input of error amp A2. The other input is across RSENSE. The current through RSENSE, and hence the
voltage drop across it, is proportional to the load current, via the current sense transistor QSENSE. The output of
A2 controls the drive (IDRIVE) to the base of the NPN output transistor, Q3 which is, proportional to the amount
and polarity of the voltage differential (VDIFF ) between AMP2 inputs, that is, how much the voltage across RSENSE
is greater than or less than the voltage across RSC. This loop gains IEXT up by another 200, thus
ISC = 2 x 200 (IEXT) = 400 IEXT (4)
Therefore, combining Equation 3 and Equation 4, and solving for REXT , we get
REXT = 400 VPROG/ISC (5)
If the VCL pin is left open, the output short circuit current will default to about 700 mA. At elevated temperatures
this current will decrease.
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