EER Joule Thief using an earth battery to start a joule thief.

[jeanna]

Well, I have to say that after a rash of attempts to make a good working galvanic battery that can rival the plant battery, I am utterly convinced that the plant battery can and does outperform anything like this.

I was able to run any of my plant batteries for over one week lighting one or two leds from a secondary.
In fact after just short of 3 months the phyllis plant battery is continuing to light the original led without any flashing or other signs of slowing down.

The convenient size of a 4" pot with a plant in it and a spiral of 20 inches of both copper and magnesium wires is the convenience winner.

The 12" pot with 60 inches of each wire is the longevity winner. It continued to light the leds for 5 weeks with the mere addition of 4 inches at the surface of the soil on a weekly basis.

GO PLANTS!

jeanna

[NickZ]

 Jeanna: 
   Ok, thanks for the update,  the barber pole is on hold. Back to watering the plants.  One thing though, you should at least get an honorable mention, for trying.
   My best to you,
                          NZ

[Pirate88179]

Jeanna:

I wonder what might happen if, after all of this time running your leds from the plant (Great job by the way!!) if you could take seeds from that plant, or a sprout, or whatever it might have, and start another plant from the one that is "used" to having the copper and mag. in its system.  Do you think the plant might adapt and possibly "learn" to use these new materials in a more efficient way?

In other words, do you think your output might actually increase by using the offspring from your original plant?

With what little I know about how nature works, I think it might be possible.  You might start a new hybrid strain of electric plants.

Excellent work you , and the others, have been doing here.

Bill

[NickZ]

  @ Jeanna, Pirate, & All:
   One thing that you might also try, is to place small rusty nails inside the pots, or in the roots of the plants.  Different metals may help with the galvanic effect.
  I always noticed that plants that are in the ground grew faster and bigger than a control group of the same plants that was in pots, right next to the ones in the ground.  I think that is because there is much more electric current flowing in the ground than in any pot. I also noticed that some plants really took off if placed in aluminum pots instead of plastic or ceramic.  I think that it all has to do with the electricity in the ground, or in the aluminum pots.  In the case of aluminum,  the older and more sulfated the metal pot the better. 
   Sorry to hear about the Barber-Pole, not paning out as well, I was hoping to use my wife's idea of incasing the B-pole in a sealed PVC pipe to keep it moist, and be more portable.
   In anycase, good luck with your work.
                                         
  @Pirate:   I'd like your recomendation as to how to built the strongest and most powerfull JT ever made so far. The big brother of the JT.  As I plan to light my house, not just LEDs but need about 10 to 20 amps or more.  I noticed that one guy hooked up a JT to a 15 pound torroid.  So, what do you say?  If you like, you can answer in a different thread, (Giant JT thread)  Very interested in Your ideas...
                                                                                      NZ

[Pirate88179]

NickZ:

To my knowledge, Jeanna has produced the highest output hand wound JT circuit to date. (See the Jeanna Circuit)

I think what you are asking for is not really possible.  The unique qualities of the JT circuit do not include boosting amps so, the trick is to find ways to use volts and frequency to run things that before folks thought required amps, or at least, mA's.  CFL's, floro tubes and leds come to mind.  With the JT circuit, you are converting amps or Ma's to higher voltage and higher frequencies.  Some of us have run motors from them but I do not think you could run a refrigerator motor with a JT circuit.  I could be wrong though.

Possibly, if new style electric motors were designed to run on volts and freq. then maybe this would be possible.  Most motors of this type used in the home require amps, and quite a few of them especially upon start up under load.

Bill