Joule Thief

[Farmhand]

Nice set-up.  Try using magnesium for the - electrodes and you should be able to get about 2.00 volts out of it.  That's about what I get, not counting those high spikes which will charge my 2.7 volt supercap fully.  I have a video on youtube running 200 leds off of my set-up and, I can also run a Bedini motor from it.  Get the largest block of magnesium you can and also, I would strip the copper off of the carbon rods as well.  Place the carbon rods on the north/south meridian to the north, and the magnesium to the south on the same line.  Not magnetic north/south, although, depending upon where you are these can be close.

I also have a cool video showing really high spikes all over the place on my scope.  It is these spikes that I assume are charging up my supercap (650 F) to 2.7 volts when I can only measure about 2 volts with my DMM.  I have been running this system for a long time now...well, actually right now it is not hooked up but maybe I should revisit this and explore it further?

Bill

Sounds good, I am kinda interested to see if the copper is consumed or whatever same with the galvanized coating on the steel. I think I'll just leave it run blinky JT for some weeks and take a look at the plates, the carbon gouging rods have a rectangular cross section (not round ones) not sure how strong they wold be without the copper, probably ok and carbon is better.

I might try the setup I describe in the Stubblefield thread, I think a setup like that would produce a lot more current from the battery and it's all compact. And with a step up secondary it could be an interesting device. I'll need to use a "single coil two transistor type oscillator" if I can't get enough primary DC voltage for an IC or micro controller to switch a logic level mosfet.

I guess I'll scratch a drawing for the other thread, I get funny idea's when I draw stuff. 

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Tinsel I'm tricked and intrigued, what did you show us ?
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[TinselKoala]

One is the tiny clothespin JT running on the smallest battery I could find in the house, in the jaws of the clothespin. The other is a special purpose JT using a 2n3055 and a large coil set, showing lighting up a filament light bulb and a NE-2 neon... in series ... on under 3V input. (The neon is bridged by a HV rectifier diode, probably 1n4007 iirc)

[Farmhand]

Nice, I've taken the leap to get buy some super capacitors, I ordered 10 x 5.5 volt - 0.22 Farad and 2 x 2.7 volts - 50 Farads.

50 Farads should run an efficient LED driver for some time.
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[Farmhand]

I noticed some discussion about single coil set ups and so I made a "Stingo" circuit with an added 1 nF capacitor across the diode in series with the PNP base.

Here's some results. And the circuit, it runs from 1.25 volts so far and can run in two modes high power and low power, see shots.

Any tips on improving the circuit are welcome, (better diodes I know), using just one coil can be advantageous I think. Sorry for beig a bit off topic.

Oh with 2.6 volts input it can hold 34 volts output across 10 x 5mm LED's in series with a 1000 uF capacitor across them. 

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[Pirate88179]

Nice, I've taken the leap to get buy some super capacitors, I ordered 10 x 5.5 volt - 0.22 Farad and 2 x 2.7 volts - 50 Farads.

50 Farads should run an efficient LED driver for some time.
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I missed out when those 3,000 Farad supercaps were on the surplus market for like $15 each.  Now they are $50-$100.  650F is the largest cap I have at this time but, I keep watching the surplus market just in case.

50 farads is a good size cap to experiment with, especially using very low draw circuits.

Bill