IRF520 N-Channel Power MOSFET

The IRF520 is a Power Mosfet with 9.2A collector current and 100V breakdown voltage. The mosfet has a low gate threshold voltage of 4V and hence commonly used with microcontrollers like Arduino for switching high current loads.

 

Pin Configuration

Pin Number	Pin Name	Description
1	Source	Current flows out through Source
2	Gate	Controls the biasing of the MOSFET
3	Drain	Current flows in through Drain

 

Features

• N-Channel Power MOSFET
• Continuous Drain Current (ID): 9.2A
• Drain to Source Breakdown Voltage: 100V
• Drain Source Resistance (RDS) is 0.27 Ohms
• Gate threshold voltage (VGS-th) is 4V (max)
• Rise time and fall time is 30nS and 20nS
• It is commonly used with Arduino, due to its low threshold voltage.
• Available in To-220 package

Note: Complete technical details can be found at the IRF520 datasheet linked at the bottom of the page

 

IRF520 MOSFET Alternatives

IRF540N, IRF3205

 

Other N-channel MOSFETS

2N7000 , FDV301N

 

IRF520 MOSFET Overview

The IRF540N is an N-Channel Power Mosfet. The Mosfet can switch loads that consume upto 9.2A continuous current and operate below 100V. It also has a decent on-state resistance of 0.27 Ohms which increases the efficiency of the Mosfet since it will dissipate less heat as loss.

This Mosfet has a low gate threshold voltage of only 4V, this means that the Mosfet can be turned on even with 5V from the GPIO pin of microcontrollers like Arduino. But this does not mean that the Mosfet will turn on completely with just 5V, it needs around 10V supplied to the gate pin to turn on completely and supply 9.2A collector current. So if you are looking for a Mosfet to be used with microcontroller then you should consider the logic level Mosfet like 2N7002 etc.

Alternatively you can also use a driver circuit to provide 10V to the gate pin of this Mosfet using a transistor. Added to this the mosfet also has good switching speeds and hence can be used in DC-DC converter circuits also.

 

Applications

• Switching high power devices
• Control speed of motors
• LED dimmers or flashers
• High Speed switching applications
• Converters or Inverter circuits

 

2D model of the component

If you are designing a PCB or Perf board with this component then the following picture from the IRF520 Datasheet will be useful to know its package type and dimensions.