Joule Thief

[dasimpson]

from what i make of that there is 2 pots with a capaciter on each if i am also looking at it right the cap goes from the 2 outer pins of the pot not the ajuster pin aka the center pin also bit confused on 100 turns center tap and 30 turns secondary im guessing the 30 is for the led but what is the 100

i am also guessing that the center pin of one pot connects to the center pin of the other pot

OK that is fine
(dyslexia makes you more flexible of brain IMHO  )

Here is a copy of one such diagram from A who also called himself fusionchip.
If you look at the base resistor you will see the pot with the arrow.
It also has a cap symbol.
This is where he put the cap on the non used leg of the pot.
I was wrong. the mA were 0.43mA or micro amps... really low!!

BTW, you can expect the amps draw to LOWER when you put more lights on the secondary... just a little piece of magic to inspire you.

Here is the pic.

jeanna

[jeanna]

I don't know the answers to your questions, but I posted this so you can see the concept.

Center tap is what the joule thief bifilar works out to be, so it refers to the bifilar primary.

Just tune the toroid you have there.
It will do best with a certain number of turns and that is specific to your toroid.

He had this way to adjust the resistor at the base, and that was the point of the post.
He used germanium PNP transistors too, so the twisted pair I suppose went to the neg rather than the pos as with the NPN, but I am guessing.

The 680pF is a rather small cap and good for this high frequency switching.
I think it caught a piece of the back spike and delivered it to the base on the next on cycle so the battery didn't need to provide that. It is tricky and brilliant.

Do you have any small value caps?
And do you have a pot for the base resistor?
If you do see what happens to your amps draw.

I will be very interested to see this.This kind of concept is useful everywhere.
Thank you,

jeanna

[dasimpson]

i have i think what is a pot from a pc fan controller i have some caps i can salvage from scrap blue one i also have a couple of the the ceramic ones old remote control cars etc have them
i think you and i have the same goal light as many leds as we can to full brightness and use as little amps as we can i really need to get a bread board i think but same old always down to money
i think this thread has drifted way off the standerd joule thief in many parts like the cam think we need a set rule for the joule thief and stick to that thro a thread aka set what restser is standerd tranny also the toriod maybe a pic to best find matches mainly soi we can al work from the same lvl plain and more or less the same starting point i know some have more money then other i use what i can salvage wich dosent tend to be alot if i do get a couple of quid spare i try and get what i need bot nine times out of ten it is bread or milk lol i also noticed you use thick coated network wire insted of magnet wire for your primery is they any reasion for that or is that what you find best

i will take a pic of my joule thief that way you can get a look at what i am playing with as it stands i have 10 bifilar winds on it with 2 wires from a network cable i also have 2 leds each has its own 5 winding on the toriod with wire i got from a floppy disk motor blue i would say o.5mm or summin and both leds are bright but i tend to find it draws about 100ma i use a bc337 transistor and a 1k resistor

I don't know the answers to your questions, but I posted this so you can see the concept.

Center A is what the joule thief bifilar works out to be, so it refers to the bifilar primary.

Just tune the toroid you have there.
It will do best with a certain number of turns and that is specific to your toroid.

He had this way to adjust the resistor at the base, and that was the point of the post.
He used germanium PNP transistors too, so the twisted pair I suppose went to the neg rather than the pos as with the NPN, but I am guessing.

The 680pF is a rather small cap and good for this high frequency switching.
I think it caught a piece of the back spike and delivered it to the base on the next on cycle so the battery didn't need to provide that. It is tricky and brilliant.

Do you have any small value caps?
And do you have a pot for the base resistor?
If you do see what happens to your amps draw.

I will be very interested to see this.This kind of concept is useful everywhere.
Thank you,

jeanna

[jeanna]

You are not alone.
Lots of people salvage. In fact gadget got most of his parts from salvage as does electricme.

I use the telephone cable because it is easy to strip and because when I needed a 100 foot length for a stubblefield coil I bought a 100 ft extension cord.It had 6 wires 24 awg all 100 ft. so, I still have plenty.
But it might work better for the primary. It doe not work for the secondary. For that you really must get the varnished wire.

Pix will be good.

You seem to have a joule thief with 2 secondaries. 5 turns for each secondary and 1 led on each.
There is another whole thread about that but I didn't realize what it was at first and called it ac from joule thief, or something like that. It might have more information for you as well. And it stays more on target too.

A breadboard will make experimenting much easier.
quid, so are you in oz? or UK?

As far as standardizing this it is and was not possible. This joule thief concept inspired so many great ideas, it has been wonderful just to be a part of the wildness. And there is no substitute for reading a few pages a day until you're done.

jeanna

[dasimpson]

ok so the higher the awg the thinner the wire ? and yes im in the uk
ill get some pictures on later today it is now like 3:30 am and i am upto i think page 210 glad you said a few a day sometimes takes me a few reads of one page to follow whats going on would you have a link for that other thread pls

i found the other thread and wow talk about jumping in at the deep end with your diagram
i think a good idea to put on the first port of every joule thief thread would be recomend the new commers to read joule thief 101

You are not alone.
Lots of people salvage. In fact gadget got most of his parts from salvage as does electricme.

I use the telephone cable because it is easy to strip and because when I needed a 100 foot length for a stubblefield coil I bought a 100 ft extension cord.It had 6 wires 24 awg all 100 ft. so, I still have plenty.
But it might work better for the primary. It doe not work for the secondary. For that you really must get the varnished wire.

Pix will be good.

You seem to have a joule thief with 2 secondaries. 5 turns for each secondary and 1 led on each.
There is another whole thread about that but I didn't realize what it was at first and called it ac from joule thief, or something like that. It might have more information for you as well. And it stays more on target too.

A breadboard will make experimenting much easier.
quid, so are you in oz? or UK?

As far as standardizing this it is and was not possible. This joule thief concept A so many great ideas, it has been wonderful just to be a part of the wildness. And there is no substitute for reading a few pages a day until you're done.

jeanna