Suggestions for high current CCS?

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I am in need of a constant current source that can put out about 250 to 300mA and that can operate while dropping minimum volts across it -- on the order of 4 to 5V or less would be great. I am currently just using a LM317 with a RESISTOR which works, but I am sure something else will work better.

I'll use these in several places, but in particular I need to supply a 5V 250mA TUBE filament and I have 9.5VDC to work with. I'll also need it for a shunt regulator that feeds a circuit that needs 15V at ~150mA from a ~20V supply.

Any ideas?
 
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dsavitsk said:
...I've used the 10m45's and the dn2540's, but I was looking for something a little better. Can you really get that much current from a cascode of these? I had assumed not, but maybe I'll try it.
You can get ones that will give you plenty of current at low Vds, suitable for using a pair in cascode (IXYS do some), but the trouble is they don't have enough power handling. I don't know of any larger ones, but there may be some out there. You don't need to use one for the cascode though, you could use an ordinary low-threshold enhancement MOSFET with a zener or diode string to provide a bias voltage for it.

This would end up more expensive than Salas's solution, but possibly with better performance.
 
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