I’ve been looking at using the Ethernet Relay Board for controlling a series of sensors in an underwater housing. Power usage is important for the mission length. When the board is at “idle” (no commands being sent), how much power does it draw? In the event the board needs to have power off until it is ready, what is the “boot” period of the board? How long from power on until we can send commands?
Also, is there an option for 24V input for controlling the board, or is it 12V only?
Are multiple relay types allowed on the same board? I’ve got some beefy subsea LEDs that draw almost 4A at full blast and some cameras that barely draw 5W, seems wasteful to use the large relays for those.
I am looking at using the CMX60D10 for the large loads and the MPDCD3 for small loads. What sort of lead time could I expect on the board delivery?
As these are going into a subsea housing, thermal considerations are important. What survivability rating does this board have? What is the highest temp it can survive? It appears that the relays can survive up to 80c, can the carrier board as well?
Standby power consumption of the board with the Ethernet module installed is going to be around 350mA at 12VDC with all relays off.
Boot time will depend on the Ethernet module authenticating with the network but I would not estimate this to take more than a 5 seconds.
The board must be powered via 12VDC as that is the required voltage for the coils of the relays installed on the board. Operating voltage range is 9-14VDC.
Yes, it is possible to purchase the solid state relay controllers with different relay types installed.
Lead time should be around 3-5 business days.
Temperature rating for the board is going to be -40 to +80C.
Thanks for the rapid response, if only all companies got back to me this quickly. What is the power draw on the board during normal operation? I will have this device plugged into an unmanaged gigabit switch, I assume there is no problem with that?
I am locking down hardware requirements now and should be able to start spec’ing out the relays that I need for the board. I am very much hoping that I don’t need the 8 relay board as that is rather large. I don’t suppose there is the possibility of a 6 relay board?
Thanks,
Will
Edits: I don’t suppose there is a full 3D model of the board? Just the drawings? Is there anything on the back side of the board? Does it need to be place against a non-conductive surface?
Power Draw during normal operation is going to be around 350mA @ 12VDC. This will increase when relays are turned on.
If you plan to plug the device into an unmanaged switch(no DHCP server) then you will need to configure a static IP address into the device. To do this connect it to a DHCP enabled network then use the NCD5500 Configuration Utility linked in this document to configure a Static IP into the module:
After that you can connect it to the unmanaged switch.
We make a 4 and an 8 relay controller. We do not make a 6 relay controller.
At this time we do not have 3D drawings of the boards, only the mechanical drawings available on the product pages.
The bottom of the board will have through hole pins sticking through. You will need to mount it using 1/4" tall standoffs.
I’ve got a few more questions. Are there any high power relays that can be sourced for the board? I’ve got 2 high power circuits (300VDC, up to 7A) that I’d like to On/Off with this board, is that possible?
I saw that there are 240VAC relays, but nothing above 60VDC (although the picture shows 100VDC). Would you recommend using 2 low power relays to trigger 2 high power relays?
I have not seen any PCB mountable relays capable of switching a load of that size. I believe this would exceed the capabilities of most PCBs. I would recommend using a smaller relay on our board to switch a larger external relay.
From the top of the PCB, how much clearance space is recommended? Just the 1.25" from the drawing? How tall is the largest SSR that can go on the board?
Was there an answer for the clearance? Is the Type (F,G,H) referring to the total amperage of the board, or just the amperage rating of the individual SSRs? Do you know the power draw of the whole board if 6 SSRs were active at the same time?
If you are only using the relay on our board to switch a larger external relay then I would highly recommend one of the 5 amp mechanical relays. They are much cheaper and will do just as good of a job. Clearance from the bottom of the PCB to the top of the 5 amp relay is approximately 1".
Just for clarification, does the Type of Board (F,G,H) refer to the total amperage that the board can handle, or the amperage of each relay on the board?
3 of my outputs are 24V at 8A, 2 of my outputs are 24V at 0.5A and one output is 24V at 2.5A.
Can I spec different relays for the different slots? No point in uprating the 0.5A connection.
We’ve ordered the board, but I noticed something when reading the data sheet for the relay. The CMX60D10 says that its control voltage is 3-10VDC. Earlier in this thread it was mentioned that the operating voltage range is 9-14VDC. Does the board handle the voltage conversion to the input pins on the relays themselves?
There is enough leniency in that specification that our board provides a safe control voltage for the relay. Due to voltage drop through the electronics on board the voltage that reaches the control lines of the solid state relay will almost never be as high as 12VDC. We have been designing and manufacturing relays since 1995 so we are very familiar with these requirements. We have been selling these boards with this relay installed for over 10 years now with no known issues.