9.6V Battery to 3V Supply

[ormo]

I have a 9.6V rechargeable battery pack. I need to use it to power a thingymabob I'm making that runs on 3V. I was hoping to be able to do something like this:

Somehow halve the voltage down to about 4.8V and double the current the battery is kicking out. Then use a regulator to bring it down to 3V. This way only 1.8V must be wasted and the device can get almost double current to use.

Is this possible or am I barking up totally the wrong tree here?

 

[Hero999]

How much current do you require?

You're better off using a switching regulator to do the 9.6V to 3V conversion in one step.

You can make a pretty efficient regulator using a couple of transistors, a few resistors, capacitors and an inductor.
https://www.romanblack.com/smps/smps.htm

 

[ormo]

Thanks for the advice... would a LM2576 be suitable for this application?

 

[ormo]

If I were to use a LM2576T-3.3 it should work well, yes?

 

[Hero999]

Yes, that should do the job.

 

[tcmtech]

Cut up the 9.6 volt pack and make three 3.2 volt packs all in parallel. no wasted power then. Just make it with connectors so you can put the three sections back as a series for charging.

 

[Diver300]

If I were to use a LM2576T-3.3 it should work well, yes?

That will give you 3.3 V. If you use the LM2576T-ADJ it you have to have two extra resistors but you can get exactly 3 V if you need it.

You haven't said how much current you are taking at 3 V. If the current is very small, less than about 5 mA, a switch mode regulator may not help.