Joule Thief

[freepow]

@ All

I now have my 5 yo son's nightlight up and working for the last few days, all I have to do is switch the charge switch on and the red(LED) comes on to show it charging the supercap, then when it has reached the charge that I want it to in the supercap, then the green(LED) comes on, I then switch the charge switch off.

When night comes and we put our 5 yo son to bed, I switch his nightlight on, and it shines quite good for
1x LED, and it usually lasts all night till morning, then its quite dim in the morning.

I usually charge the supercap up to only about 1.3-1.5v ,that seems to light the LED all night for him.

I could charge it up to 2.5v or even 2.7 if I wanted to, but hey! it works fine as it is...

The box is a clear lid one at approx 60x65x40mm dimensions, the small solar cell is outside at 4.0v 80mA.

The current draw is very low for this 1x LED joulethief.

[dasimpson]

kb25 what is the voltage and ampage you get from one cell of your eb

[dasimpson]

wow i wasent that many pages behind lol.

ok my test was to have an automated system for testing a joule thief charge vs a standerd charge

the idea is 2 solar panels garden light ones are good as long as they give the same voltage and ampage

on the postive side we wont a low voltage drop diode

on circuit one this goes to the battery
on circuit two this goes to the jt then the from the jt to the battery with a diode on the collector side to the positive of the battery

on both circuits the positive of the batterys runs to a double swtching realy this will turn both outputs on at the same time this realy is part of a light and dark circuit with a separate power saurce the light sencer will be in the same place as the solar panels this turns on when it detects darkness

ok from the realy on the output will go to 2 to separate jt's with one led on each basicly a jt for each battery
the led is put in a tube with a photocell the light detection circuit is set to turn on when there is light detected
the realy of the light dectection circuit is wired to a analog clock and the battery

now cover the solar panels and senser the clocks should start ticking when they stop everything is ready
at midnight reset the clocks to midnight remove the cover from the solar panels and senser and the experement is set.

my idea is the sun will large the batterys when it goes dark the system will turn on
if the jt dose charge better than the standerd way then the clock should of been ticking for longer

ok i know that it is said that you need to discharge and recharge the jt charge battery oftern to get best results

this system has accounted for that if i am right and the jt charge idea is true then the clock should get closer and closer to the standerd charge clock and if it works better should pass the amount of hours it lasts

hope this makes sence i would try it but i havent got the money to test this

i feel the standerd charged bettery will always last longer

[kb24]

kb25 what is the voltage and ampage you get from one cell of your eb

Hi dasimpson, i get 0.8V and 0.1mA. How bout you? How big is your EB? 

[dasimpson]

i dont have a garden to build one.
but i am hopeing this summer to get some planters for the back yard to test.
ok you may try wireing the cells in parallel. I think your problem is you dont have enogth ampage from your eb.
hopefully putting them in parallel should sort that.
my jt has 10 turns on the base and 20 for the collecter.
i find i can get it started on about 0.55volts and 6 mah but to do this i have a cap in parallel with the battery.

Hi dasimpson, i get 0.8V and 0.1mA. How bout you? How big is your EB?