Solar Joule Thief Circuits

[NickZ]

@SW:
That looks like a great little circuit. Is that 11 turns bifilar and 22 secondary? With a one watt Led bulb? The straw hat warm white bulbs do come in one watt size I think, or use two of the 0.5 watt bulbs.
I'll give that circuit a try also. I have a couple one inch ferrite toroids and some 2n2222As transistors that would work for that. I do need to get some more magnet wire though. Any ways, let us know how it goes.
My tiny solar panel with the bumble bee Jt did charge a 10v 4700 mf capacitor to 3 volts today, and it will keep the led on without any light going to the solar panel, but for only a couple of minutes. It's a start. But I'll try to charge an dead AA battery tomorrow instead to see what happens.
I've been having real good luck charging batteries while lighting an Led with my other 4 AA Jt. (also with a one inch toroid) by swapping batteries back on and forth. It does charges great, but I do have to swap them every 6 hours or so. Still it's about as close to free energy as I've seen yet. I'll put in a switch on it soon, so I can swap the batteries by just flipping a switch. I'll send some more pictures.
I also made a couple different two inch air core toroids today, that I'm still working on.
Thanks for posting the sketch above, looks like it's worth replicating.
NZ

[SkyWatcher]

Hi folks, Hi Jenn Meredith, I haven't researched that much into home solar power plants because at the cost even with rebates is out of the question at this time. Though we all make choices, albeit the choices have been very limited due to a handful of power crazed embodied souls and their methods of dumbing down people has been very effective till lately, though my view is if one takes advantage of this benefit(rebate) I can't help imagine that somehow by doing so, you will forfeit your rights to do as you please with your solar power system. I hope I'm wrong, however it smells of corruption to me.
Hi Nick, I actually made an air core toroid also, going to test it soon. I built that gadgetmall circuit 1.2volt AA, though I do not have an ultracap(boostcap), nor do i have a decent nichrome heater element, but i do have a few large car audio 1.5 farad super capacitors. I used a 1" ferrite toroid with 12 turns - 24 gauge bifilar and 24 turns of 24 gauge secondary and used a 1 watt luxeon led connected to secondary output, then hooked the 1.5 farad supercap to the regular collector/emitter output with diode, also using tip42c with 1kohm base resistor because it seems to run the circuit better. I powered up the circuit and initially the cap was about .4volts and it slowly charged the cap, while the led was not lighting and then once the cap was above the battery voltage the luxeon led started to get brighter and brighter until it reached it's full output for the settings the circuit is at right now, I'd say it's 70% of full brightness. Cap rose so far to 2.8 volts and is still climbing slowly, one thing i notice is that no matter if the cap is hooked up or not it doesn't change the brightness level of the led, so it seems that once the 1.5 AA's voltage is exceeded by the cap that any load removed from the cap after that point will have no affect on the input or the output of secondary, which in this case now is the luxeon led. More testing to be done.
peace love light
Tyson

[NickZ]

SW:
Your last build sounds great. So, you are able to light the one watt Led bulb with the secondary, to 3/4 brightness, while charging the cap at the same time.
I am charging two new AAs that are now discharged, but I'm charging them back up with the pulses from Solar Bumble Bee Jt. I can charge a cap to 3 volts using only the tiny solor panel, but since the light from the cap only lasts about a minute running the Led, I'm using the two AAs now to see how they will charge up, and how long the charge will last.
I recovered a 3.7 volt rechargeable phone battery that was totally dead, and would not take a charge, by a 1 hour charge by a Jt. The phone is still working two weeks later. It is now charging fine on the regular phone charger. Minor miracles do happen.

[SkyWatcher]

Hi folks, Hi Nick, thanks for sharing your experiment results, yes i built the gadgetmall circuit and it does work like he says, though I'm having good results right now with a different setup charging a 1.2 volt AA rechargeable while using the typical 1.2volt AA rechargeable for the input. I switched toroids to the 1/2" diameter and 24 gauge bifilar which is giving much better light output that hurts to look at and charging of the AA which is right after the leds on the regular JT output. Here is the simple circuit.
peace love light
Tyson


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[SkyWatcher]

Hi folks, I used the circuit I just posted previously and found that while it charged the secondary AA cell and it held a voltage about 3 times what the primary battery lost and when swapped it ran the circuit, however it was not as solid a charge, some what fluffy. So I'm testing right now this modification to the circuit, a super capacitor in parallel with the secondary charge battery, though an ultracap(boostcap) might even be more ideal, also the capacitor is in line with the led diodes, then i put the AA cell in parallel off of that in hopes that it will attain a more solid charge. With this setup, it is charging the battery well, so we will see if it charges better this way. Here is a cad pic of the circuit addition.
peace love light
Tyson


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[NickZ]

SW:
I'm also playing around with different capacitors to see what's what. They do seam to be able to slightly boast the charging volts of the Jt by a volt or two.
Nice idea combining the cap and the battery, that's what I'm doing now, also.
NZ

[SkyWatcher]

Hi Nick, thanks for your thoughts. I'm trying to figure out a way to get as close to the same charge return in a secondary charge battery. Problem is, if we can't get an equivalent solid charge back that isn't fluffy, then it's not that useful. Though i think there is a way and gadgetmall using that ultracap that is part capacitor/battery seems to do it well, that's why I figured trying a capacitor in parallel.
peace love light
Tyson

[Watson]

SkyW and All:
I think that it's important that any of the toroid coils and wire combinations are able to light off of a single AA, if not we're just pissing in the wind.
I think that with the right solar panel and the right JT circuits ,a solar panel can run many JTs circuits, at night and recharge itself (capacitors) during the day. That is what I'm working towards, for now.
My tiny 2 volt solar panel is charging a capacitor now. So far it is all working like it should on about 1 1/2 volts and can even go down to less than 1/2 volt and the Led is still on, even with 7 leds (dim).
More tests will be done on it today to see how long it will last at night just from the charge in the capacitor.
Although I don't have super caps, I do have a handfull of capacitors that come out of Pc power supplies, etz... Maybe someone can recommend which mF and voltage caps can be used best. I feel like soldering all the caps together to see what they'll charge to. No, Yes?
Your tests on the lantern are looking real promising. Check the link to the warm whites leds from Ebay, (below).
I have a 16 light Led Emergency Back-up light that I'll be doing something similar with, also. It charges a capacitor and last about 3 hours now as is, but hopefull I can install a Jt into the circuit and make it last a whole night, running off the capacitor that it has. It recharges the cap back, off of the grid.

Check out these warm white 140degree Leds:
20 PC 0.5 Watt StrawHat 8mm 140° WARM White LED 90Kmcd - eBay (item 250448852092 end time Oct-13-10 16:47:29 PDT)

For storage capacitors, you need multiple Farads. Using a bunch of 1000 microfarad caps is not enough, they will only run a JT for a fraction of a minute. I got some 10F (not uF!) supercapacitors from Sparkfun.com. i also bought some 50F supercaps from Mouser.com, but they were back ordered for more than a month. Most supercaps are rated at around 2.5 volts.

For solar cells, I got some from Solar Cell. It looks like the 2V circular cells were for a garden light.

I have a lot of info on Joule Thiefs in my blogs.

[Matthew Jones]

Them Futurlec Solar cells are way to expensive with shipping. Your talking 9 -12 dollars a watt.
You buy B grade cells on ebay for 10% of what they cost there. You might have to build your own little case or something but....

Futurlec liable to make you wait a month or better before you get anything out of them. They have terrible delays and real poor service.

Matt

[Guruji]

JT

Hi guys Gadgetmall had a nice circuit to this lighting leds and charging at the same time.

[NickZ]

Guys:
Thanks for all your replies. I just charged the new rechargeable wireless phone batteries most of the day in the sun using my tiny solar panel connected to a Jt, but although the battery did take a 2 volts charge, the Leds are still dim. I charged the same new 3.7v phone battery 30 minutes on the regular phones charger, and it lit my Jts Leds 100%.
I think that these 3.7v rechageable phone batteries will work just fine with the Jtc.
Now I just need to get a better solar panel. Thanks for all your suggestions.
It does seam like Ebay's source for grade B solar panels 3"by6" 36 piece set for $55 is a deal. 18 volts total voltage for charging a 12 volt battery.
That would light many 12 volt Jtc, and several hundred Leds... Might not save the world, but it would light my bathroom, and my Christmas tree, ha ha...
NickZ

[NickZ]

SkyWatcher, Watson, and All:
I find that if I charge TWO AA batteries by using another set of two AA run batteries from a Jt. And, I return the negative rail of the transistor to the battery positive, instead of to the negative side. It works great, and charges strong (no fluff), until the batteries finally starts to lose their charge. But even when the volt meter say 0, I'm still lighting Leds. At that point a joule bump (solar recharge) is in order. Then it all works fine again, runs strong and cool, no fluff.
It appears that it is very important to keep the input voltage steady, and not alow it to get to low, or the benefits of having the Jt in the circuit are lost.
Watson- thanks for the info on the caps.
They look nice, and I'm sure they have their place.
I think that maybe the best bet still are the sealed lead-acid batteries, for now. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
What I'm hoping to build is a 12 volt Solar Jt that uses a Run Capacitor to start and run itself (for hours at night if needed). And also to be able to charge lead-acid batteries, while providing some usable light for the home. At the same time also feeding-back some output to the run capacitor, thus eventually not needing the solar panels addition input. So it's self running and charging while lighting Leds.
NZ

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[SkyWatcher]

Hi folks, Hi lighting up hope, I would say that this site and the other one has all the ideas one needs to build things to help people, though it should be dirt cheap and no profit made from such an endeavor.
Hi Nick, funny you bring up using 12 volts. I've never had much luck with the JT circuits running 12 volts due to heat in transistor, though I have had good results from the bedini style oscillator circuit, which is just a couple changes to the JT circuit. In fact, just today I was trying to pump up the brightness of a couple new toroids and beads I just wound and have to use 2 AA's to get the brightness I'm looking for and the JT circuit pnp tip42 was getting hot. So I decided to wire it up bedini style and there is no heat at all now and the 12 warm white led's in parallel are burning spots in my eyes if I look at them too long. I will be doing a duration test later to see how this compares with the JT style oscillator. Another thing which I know jeanna and others mentioned, was the fact that the leds do not get warm when powered this way, though just today I ran my 20 led string off the wall power and they did get warm . So it seems there is even more benefit to running led lights this way, it means they should last a whole lot longer than even what they are rated for, since I'm sure they take the heat into account to base their rated hours on.
peace love light
Tyson

[NickZ]

SW:
The warm white Leds, or regular clear 12 volt bulb (like the car bulbs) give the kind of like that I can put up with. So, a 12 volt joule thief (or several of them) that can light 500 to 1000 leds, would probably do. As I wouldn't be too happy having to use the light from the CFL bulbs. I am looking for practical uses for the Jt, and not just to see how long I can light a single bulb or two, but to see how long I can make alot of them last at least 6 hours if not all night long.
With a 12 volt solar panel keeping the input voltages steady, connected to a 12 volt battery, several 12 volt Jt circuits should should be able to light up many Led bulbs, all night long, and recharge during the day. That is what I am working on.
I am already using the light from a 16 led Emergency Back-up light that is giving me now 5 hours of light each night, and recharging itself off the grid during the day.
But the trick is to make the devices self run without external input.
NickZ