Paralleling outputs on TB6612 motor driver

I've worked with a few motor drivers but I've never worked with a Toshiba TB6612.

I now have a requirement for a small DC brushed motor H-bridge, requiring 1.4A peak current. By 'small' I mean it must fit between the pins of an Arduino Pro Mini. Surface-mount is preferred as I will be getting a PCB from OSHPark. The TB6612 seems to fit my requirement. It has dual outputs, each of which is capable of driving my load, according to the datasheet. Since I only need to drive one motor, I was thinking of tying the A and B inputs and outputs together, just to spread the heating out across the whole chip.

Can you think of any reason why it might be a bad idea to parallel the outputs like this? The datasheet doesn't have much to say on the topic. It does helpfully tell you not to plug it in incorrectly. :slight_smile:

Well that one sank like a stone!

My PCB arrived today and I can report that the 6612 works fine with the inputs and outputs paralleled. I haven't done any real measurements on it but there's no magic smoke.

Its a stateless H-bridge using MOSFETs, so yes you can parallel it. Bipolar's aren't
safe to parallel due to the positive tempco, and if the chip has internal state (such as
error or its own PWM generation) then generally you can't paralllel.

Thanks Mark. That's the type of answer I was originally looking for.