New to the board and I'm looking for a little direction for an H bridge circuit

[pat h]

I'm need a current amplifier to boost a 12v signal that runs an actuator - leads change polarity to change direction with zero voltage being stopped. I tried an H bridge made up of cube relays, but it cycles too much and the relay life is about 16 hours. An FET H bridge looks like it would work, but I'm not sure my rotating polarity input signal is compatible - seems like normally it just uses an switch to select direction or a pwm signal to turn it on more often or less often. I now realize why I changed majors from EE to ME, but I still need a booster. It's likely I'm not thinking about this right and I'd appreciate any direction. I really didn't find an older post that fit my application so I thought I'd ask.

For those familiar with ag electronics I'm basically taking the output of a raven flow control console that normally runs a small motor controlled valve (1 amp max) and instead trying to control a 10amp linear actuator that controls a 6" ball valve. I have a pwm signal output available, but it isn't configurable to reverse the motor direction (only speed it up or slow it down).

thanks,

Pat

 

[mister_rf]

One idea is to reproduce an additional H-bridge using 4 MOSFETs. The schematic is shown below:

 

[pat h]

Thanks, it looks pretty simple - the reversing polarity of p1/p2 would turn on different mosfets to determine motor direction. what is the 'turn on' voltage for the mosfets/what value do r1/r2 need to be? p1/p2 is +/- 12 vdc and U1 would be 12v as well.

thanks again,

Pat