100W MOSFET Power Amplifier

The circuit diagram shows a single channel of my simple MOSFET power amplifier.
For stereo applications two identical units would be required.
Although this amplifier was designed with simplicity and ease of construction as a
primary goal, do not be mislead by its simplicity, it will compete with some of the
best amplifiers around.
I have decided to make the board very compact and included the resevoir caps and
rectifier bridge on board therefore only a power transformer is needed to make it
work.
The output power is related to the power transformer rating that you choose to use.
The table below shows approximate RMS power output for a particular transformer
rating. The amplifier is stable with a supply voltage as low as +-12VDC, but this
would be rather pointless as the power output will be only about 6 watts.

Transformer VAC

VA Rating

RMS Output

24 - 0 - 24

120

50 Watt 8 Ohms

30 - 0 - 30

180

75 Watt 8 Ohms

35 - 0 - 35

226

100 Watt 8 Ohms

If you are planning a stereo amplifier use two seperate power transformers, one for
each channel as it does make for a far better sounding amplifier.
The circuit is very simple and uses two MPSA 56 (or BC 556C) as a differential input
pair followed by BD 139-10 as differential VAS stage while a pair of BD 140-10 are
used as a current mirror.
Interestingly, adding the current mirror made no difference to distortion, but
reduced the DC offset to less than 20mV. The improvement was noteworthy.
The MOSFETS are Hitachi lateral devices, 2SK1058 (N-Channel) and 2SJ162 (PChannel).
These are designed specifically for audio, and are far more linear than the more
common switching devices that many MOSFET amps use.
Unfortunately, they are not cheap, but their performance in an audio circuit far
exceeds vertical MOSFETS or HEXFETS.
Note that using HEXFETS or any other vertical MOSFET type is not an option. They
will fail in this circuit!
The most critical aspect of the design is the PCB layout, and it is very doubtful that
if you make your own board, that you will get performance even approaching mine.
Power output is essentially unchanged, but distortion and stability are achieved by
a compact and carefully designed layout for the front end and driver circuits, which
minimises any adverse PCB track coupling that causes much higher distortion
levels, and may cause oscillation.
Please note: The output devices are mounted under the board facing up so that the
whole board will be screwed down onto the heat sink. Remember to use silicon
grease and mica whashers else you will be short circuiting the positive and negative
power supplies.

Typical Amplifier Performance:

Maximum Output:

100 watts rms into 8 Ohms

170 watts rms into 4 Ohms
20 Hz - 20 kHz (+0, -0.5 dB)

Audio Frequency Linearity:

32 dB
Closed Loop Gain:
-92 dB (input short circuit)
Hum and Noise:
Less than 13 mV (input short circuit)
Output Offset Voltage:
Less than 13 0 (10 Hz - 20 kHz)
Phase Linearity:
Less than 0.008% at any power level
Harmonic Distortion:
Less than .01% at maximum power
IM Distortion:

R19
2
0E22
Resistor
5 Watt
R25
------------------------------------------------------------C3
2
100N
5_0 mm
C7
------------------------------------------------------------R24
1
10E
Resistor
1 Watt
------------------------------------------------------------R8
1
10K
Resistor
250mW
------------------------------------------------------------C1
1
10u
06 mm
------------------------------------------------------------R9
2
1K0
Resistor
250mW
R10
------------------------------------------------------------R14
1
1K2
Resistor
250mW
------------------------------------------------------------D1
2
1N4148
DSC
D2
------------------------------------------------------------D3 D4 D5 D6 4
1N5404
DSC
------------------------------------------------------------R23
1
2K2
Resistor
250mW
------------------------------------------------------------Q3
1
2SJ162
TOP-3P
------------------------------------------------------------Q5
1
2SK1058
TO-3P
------------------------------------------------------------R12
2
3K9
Resistor
250mW
R13
------------------------------------------------------------C8
2
4700u
25 mm
C9
------------------------------------------------------------R5
2
470E
Resistor
250mW
R6
------------------------------------------------------------C4
1
470P
5_0 mm
------------------------------------------------------------R3
1
39K
Resistor
250mW
------------------------------------------------------------R2
4
47K
Resistor
250mW
R15
R16
------------------------------------------------------------C2
1
470u
10 mm
------------------------------------------------------------C5
2
82P
5_0 mm
C6
------------------------------------------------------------Q9
2
BD139-10
TO-126
Q10
-------------------------------------------------------------

Q7
2
BD140-10
TO-126
Q8
------------------------------------------------------------Q1
2
MPSA56 (BC556)
TO-92
Q12
-------------------------------------------------------------