Lighting Burnt Filament Fluorescent Bulbs with Higher Voltage

[SkyWatcher]

Hi folks, thought to start a new thread, as this may be of value to others.
Know that others have experimented with this in the past using ignition coils and other methods of high voltage pulses.
Though, it seems very very little information is to be found on the internet about using this age old method that Tesla used, that of higher voltage impulse methods.
Going to re-post this from other thread and also another circuit a man shared on a web site.
Please feel free to share any and all information and experiments you may have relating to powering gas filled bulbs without needing to use the filaments inside of them.
Though am aware that cold cathode fluorescent bulbs still use a warm filament inside, its temperature is far less than other standard fluorescent bulbs.
Ideally though, we would want to have a device that does not need to use these filaments at all, so that a gas filled bulb can used forever, or as long as the gas remains and other phosphorescent illuminating properties remain.

Hi folks, been focusing on lighting fluorescent hot filament bulbs with higher voltage, similar to what people have done with ignition coils and such, though in this case, not quite so high of a voltage.
Have built a few different transformers over the past few days, using the Meissner oscillator circuit to power them, as the heat and efficiency seems better.
The latest model seems to be working very well.
The core is made from two, glued together home speaker audio crossover, solid ferrite rods.
Then, 6 layers of 30awg. magnet wire, for around 1500 turns with electrical tape between each layer.
Then, on top of that, 4 layers of 16 gauge speaker wire, for 56 bifilar turns, or 28 primary turns and 28 trigger wire turns.
The bulb seen running in the image, has a blown filament on one side and is still lighting very nicely.
Not completely sure if the bulb is somehow still using the other filament to help light the bulb, or if the high voltage alone is lighting the bulb, which is the goal.
The cfl shown is a 13 watt, using 680 milliamps at 12volt input.
Share your thoughts on this, as the goal is to light these bulbs without using the filaments, or basically a blown bulb that would not work in a normal wall socket, even if the cfl electronic ballast was fine.
And feel free to share any experiments of lighting fluorescent lights that are essentially blown or like a neon glow tube or cold(warm) cathode fl.
Thanks.


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Also, here is a link to the web site of the man lighting burnt filament cfl bulbs and a link to his youtube video.
http://makelifeeasy.yolasite.com/
Burnt CFL Re-Light - YouTube

Also, here is the latest transformer/circuit tested that seems to be powering a burnt filament cfl, one filament is burnt out on one side and is still lighting the cfl well.


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peace love light
tyson

[Ufopolitics]

That is simply Awesome!!

Great find SkyWatcher!!

I see you are directly "jumping" the broken filament...without the electronic ballast...awesome...and understandable...the HV Arcs inside between broken filaments just like a spark gap...exciting the gas molecules...therefore turning it on to great luminosity...

You have found another way to blow the existing concepts of Consumption Society...

Now...any broken lamp will still glow...

Awesome work!!


Warm regards


Ufopolitics

[Nick_Z]

Skywatcher, Ufopolitics and All:

Thanks for starting this new thread.

What I'm finding, regarding the lighting of standard un-gutted Cfls, is that if the voltage output of our homemade transformer coil is too high, it can and does burn the internal circuit (pop) of the Cfls. So, then you'll have to gut it to continue to use it, using all four little wires that come off the bulb. With extremely high voltages, as well as some current, these 4 thin wires will start to glow, also. and to carbonize the inside of the bulb, in time. So, I think that it's important to not overdrive these Cfls, as their long range usefulness may be reduced. Proper voltages, as well as current and frequency levels are still very important for them to continue to light for years.
The use of incandescent bulbs is not really something recommended for these types of inverter set ups, as they are a waist of battery charge. Although I do love their light quality, as well as the warm white flat top led bulbs like you and I use.

Ufo: I'm still very interested in your system of lighting the big Cfls, (65 watts and higher Cfls, and/or florescent tubes), on low current higher voltages. I would love to see a new thread for that purpose, as well.
I'm not interested in motors, with moving parts at the moment, but the solid state non-moving pulse switching generators systems are still captivating my fancy. Any new information, would be most welcome.

Nick_Z

[Zardox]

A few years back there was a lot of people playing with defferent circuits lighting gutted cfl's. And I admit that from time to time I still like to hook one up every once and a while. However it has been my experience that it just isn't worth the effort. For the amount of light that you get for the currant draw a led bulb is always going to beat it. With that said I hope that you can make me eat my words. Good luck and I don't want to derail anybody from their experiments.

[SkyWatcher]

Hi folks, thanks for all the replies.
Hi Ufo, thanks for the kind words.
Think your explanation is correct, as the bulb shown lighted, was not able to be lighted using the other transformer that was used in the Meissner oscillator lamp, because it had that one blown filament.
And most definitely, this is the angle of value we see.
By reusing burnt filament bulbs, really slows down the societies built upon destruction, rather than positive construction and making things to last very long, like they use to more often in the old days, though obviously not in the interest of the few power brokers.
Once an led is burnt, that's it, no reigniting those and AC led bulbs still have ballast circuitry that is designed, I'M SURE, to have a premature life (predetermined obsolescence).

Hi nick, thanks for the kind words.
Agreed, we probably don't want to apply too much current to these gutted bulbs, it may harm the phosphorescent material inside, though that does not apply to some other type gas bulbs.
Also, the gutted 13 watt cfl shown in the image above, lights up to the same brightness using same input power, with only one wire per side connected, so the filaments do not even come into play.

Now that it is very apparent, that these cfl's and many other gas bulbs can potentially last very long, it does make one ponder all the demonizing of these bulbs and other gas bulbs.
It might be a good assumption, that the lighting industry, is big business and if someone put a device on the market to power cfl's, etc. for a very long time (decades), then the lack of much information on the net and the demonizing makes sense.
Just a few cents to throw about, hehe.
Going to modify the Meissner lamp with this transformer, so it can power any bulb thrown at it, gutted that is.
peace love light
tyson

[totoalas]

Hi Skywatcher

from previous experience sice the gutted cfls had burned filaments or open circuit
the only thing needed is to ignite the gas
ways to do it are same as in hv neons where they wrap thin wires for conduction
egg magnets show also to easily expand the ignition effect
as for the coils
NILS by Slayer and jonny Davro can save lots of wires

[SkyWatcher]

Hi totoalas, thanks for reply, yes exciter always works ok, though never had much luck getting good brightness for low input and heat.
This circuit and transformer was working well, now it seems to be changing oscillation mode after a minute.
Will probably have to rewind the 30awg. wire and leave a gap at the ends of each layer, since it may be arcing at the ends, didn't cover a few layers in minor spots and did not put gaps at ends.
So this is probably causing the erratic oscillation mode, where it goes from 680 milliamps at good brightness to 1.5 amps at lower brightness and then causes massive heat buildup in transistor.
Off to rewind this thing.
peace love light
tyson

[SkyWatcher]

Hi folks, Rewound the transformer and it works fine now.
Probably was arcing inside before.
Ran it for an hour today, using the blown filament 13 watt cfl and it ran very stable.
Even the dimming using the potentiometer is far better, can get the input down to around 20 milliamps and still lighting solid, albeit dimly.
Will run this many nights to observe if it remains reliable.
For the input of around 7.5 watts, compared to a 40 watt incandescent bulb that is in another lamp here, it comes very close to that light output.
Going to test some other bulbs, another one that was given, that may have a blown filament also.
Anyone else have a desire to try relighting burnt out cfl's, if you do, please share any ideas or experiments you have made or may be planning to make, thanks.
peace love light
tyson

[SkyWatcher]

Hi folks, for those interested, was still having an issue with the 16 gauge speaker wire version of the transformer, though after an hour or so it would start to go into an unstable oscillation causes higher amps and lower brightness.
So rewound the bifilar speaker wire with 18awg. bifilar magnet wire and also placed a non-polarized capacitor in parallel with the 1 Kohm resistor that is across the positive to base.
It now oscillates very stable and only draws 550 milliamps for the same brightness.
Though the speaker wire may still work ok, if that capacitor is added for stable oscillation.
Before, when using the speaker wire and no parallel capacitor, could hear a hiss or white noise sound faintly coming from transformer, then when the bulb heated a bit, it would oscillate with a solid tone.
Now, it does not hiss like that, not sure if that was some kind of internal arcing or just an unstable harmonic oscillation.
peace love light
tyson
HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO ALL THAT IS