Im looking for a way to get around 24DC 10A without the use of batteries, any suggestions.
You could get a pair of 12V 10A power supplies and connect them in series.
ALL Electronics has a 12V 9.1A for $17 each +S&H but that's a PEAK rating, not a steady rating (other sources show it as 6.5A steady, so a quad setup - a pair in series with another pair in parallel to that -- would give you 24V and 13A for as long as you want. If you're powering a laser, how long will you use it before switching it off, anyway?) That would cost about $85 for steady use, or $45 for intermittent use. Link:
12VDC 9.1A SWITCHING POWER SUPPLY | AllElectronics.com
but it doesn't have a case around it. You could mount them bottom-to-bottom on a piece of wood and fit the whole shebang inside one vented case, or just make a clunky wooden enclosure and punch lots of holes in it. Input is 100-240VAC 50/60Hz so they should work almost anywhere in the world. Make sure any mounting hardware is electrically isolated.
The ALL photo suggests these were intended for a commercial installation -- I don't see matching Molex plugs to connect them up. At high current, over time, Molex connector pins (the flexy half that mates against the pin on the PC board) will get too hot and eventually melt/burn the plastic anyway (I've seen it happen, it's a mess since the flexy metal gets burnt up, too).
If I were you, I'd use a pair of needle-nose pliers to carefully bend out the top half of the pins I want (and/or nippers to clip off any unused pins nearby ) and solder heavy wire directly to them. It looks like there's a 2-pin 120VAC input plug and a multi-pin DC output plug. They don't mention a 'sense' or 'feedback' function to finely regulate the output, which you probably don't need anyway (to compensate for voltage loss in the wiring) so I'm guessing many of the pins are duplicates or dummies. If they're dupes, try to use both for your connector wire. I'd also check the solder connections on the pins at the PC board to be certain they put enough solder on the joint and formed a good meniscus (they often don't).
I'd invest in a 12VDC PC fan to keep the whole thing cool -- just pull power from one of the supplies. Power supplies are not designed to run constantly at full power, and it sounds like that's what you're planning to do. Any heatsink that's too hot to touch (120 degrees F) is too hot. As always, be certain the heatsink is not
electrically hot before touching it, too. (Check with a voltmeter from heatsink to circuit ground and also to an earth ground.)
If you don't have a voltmeter, you should have one. I like the Elenco M-1750, about $33 from Amazon.com (AC/DC/Ohms/Continuity/Frequency/Capacitance/Gain) Link:
Amazon.com: Elenco - Digital Mulitmeter with 3 1/2 Digit Display: Toys & Games
Otherwise, Mouser has 24V 10A supplies that are ready to go, but they start at over $100. Link:
Linear & Switching Power Supplies
You could build a conventional power supply with a transformer and diodes, capacitors, regulator, etc., but a 10A transformer would be very heavy and a 24VDC 10A regulator would be pricey. ALL has a 24V 5A transformer for $30, so you'd need two, so it would be nearly $70 just for the transformers (unless you can find some high-amp 12's or 24's just laying around -- not very likely). 30V-35V large capacitors (you have to allow some tolerance) are expensive, too, unless you can find a surplus supply. Large electrolytic capacitors dry out over the years and must be replaced. If you don't know how to build power supplies (make adjustments for ripple, surges, etc.) this is probably not a good idea.
If you want to go totally steampunk on us, you could connect a scavenged electric motor from an old washing machine using belts and pulleys to a pair of 12VDC junkyard car/truck alternators wired in series. They'd load 10A without breaking a sweat if they spun fast enough, self-regulate to 13.5V each (so 27VDC out) over a wide range of RPM's, possibly be pretty cheap, but not very small, safe, portable or quiet. Check for AC ripple with a DVM on low AC range.
You could also use industrial-grade rectifiers they usually use in hi-lo lift trucks and a simple voltage divider to scale 110VAC down to around 20VAC and convert to DC, but if you don't know what that means, you're probably in over your head. Possibly cheap, but requires serious safety considerations.
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