Super Simple Joule Thief Charger

[ibpointless2]

When making a Joule thief or a bedini circuit we are faced with many factors that may change the outcome or the lack of an outcome. We must deal with coil size, coil wire, coil core, transistors, magnets, materials, and many other factors. So that is why I have created a very simple joule thief charger out of a simple solar garden light. I remove the solar panel, add a diode and a new LED. Its not expensive either. The solar garden light was about $2.50 at Walmart, the LED was $.99 and the Diode was another $.99, Simple and cheap!

I have a circuit diagram of it here, I’ve added an on/off switch to the negative of the run battery to give me greater control in the final design.

Walmart Joule Thief AA Charger.jpg



I also posted a Youtube video of it here working.

YouTube - Simple Joule Thief Charger




It works really well, actual surpassingly well! Last night I ran it for a while to just test it all out. The run battery started out with 1.499 volts and the charge battery started out with 1.210 volts. I shut it all down and went to sleep. I let it sit over night so that if it did get a phantom voltage it would have disappeared by morning. By morning the Run battery had 1.491 volts and the charge battery had 1.242 volts. This was amazing, I lost .008 but gained .032 volts. I was so in disbelieve that I left it alone from 6 am to 3 pm, sure enough the charge battery was still at 1.242 volts but the run battery made another climb to 1.493. If a battery can hold its charge for nearly 24 hours then it must be real power inside of it.

It’s simple, so anyone can do it, and its fun too. I’m thinking about making a night light version or a flash light version; I can use a flashlight while I charge a battery! Use it when your camera says its batteries are dead, the dead battery can charge another.

The solar garden light is a Westinghouse item #474005-41W
The led are radio shack 276-0041 ( 2.8 volts - 28mA - 10mcd)
The diode is a 1n4007.

[Joit]

Hi.
Does your Charge Batterie goes hot over Time?
That is, what the Comments at your Vid are about. They think it may will explode, because "You cant charge Batteries"
Usual when you charge with a Joule Thief, the Batteries should stay could,
else they are pysically damaged, or the Duty Cycle is to big.
And what i do see most of the Time is, that the Minus of the Batterie is connected to Plus Suorce.
Its kinda different, what you do show as Setup.
But, by the Way, when i connect a Strobe light to the Leads,
then it shows, that the Current flows in from the Plus Source to Minus Charge Batterie.
So not sure, if it works the Way like you do connect it, with a blocking Diode at Minus, too.

[ibpointless2]

Hi.
Does your Charge Batterie goes hot over Time?
That is, what the Comments at your Vid are about. They think it may will explode, because "You cant charge Batteries"
Usual when you charge with a Joule Thief, the Batteries should stay could,
else they are pysically damaged, or the Duty Cycle is to big.
And what i do see most of the Time is, that the Minus of the Batterie is connected to Plus Suorce.
Its kinda different, what you do show as Setup.
But, by the Way, when i connect a Strobe light to the Leads,
then it shows, that the Current flows in from the Plus Source to Minus Charge Batterie.
So not sure, if it works the Way like you do connect it, with a blocking Diode at Minus, too.

Oh the exploding thing is just an inside joke with the guy about building custom computers and how some people make theirs look like bombs, it was merely a good poke at me and my mess of wiring.

Everything in the circuit stays cool and quiet. So let me get this straight, when you seen a normal joule thief charger the negative is plugged into the positive?
It seems to work great like the way it is now, but I was skeptical about the blocking diode too but it works.

Have you tried to make one its really simple to do? I keep getting good results, like last night the run battery started with 1.493 and the charge battery started with 1.155 (used a different battery then the original experiment) and shut it off at night and went to sleep and when I woke up the run battery was at 1.489 and the charge battery was at 1.193; I lost .004 but I gained .038!

[Joit]

Hi,
No, sorry, i dont get the Parts for it, the next Walmart is about 50 Miles from me away.

And yes, usually it is connected from Colector over the Diode to Plus.
--> + -PowerCoil - to Collector and Diode - > + Charge '-' -> back to Plus
...|->-TriggerCoil - to Base.
Emitter to Minus.
Some do connect the Charge Minus to Minus, and it does charge faster for them,
but i would afterwards compare, wich Method gives more Capacity at the Batterie.
I see double Capacity, when i charge them with the Backpath to Plus Source,
and never really tried it otherwise.

About your losses at your Source Batterie, it is hard to say also, how much you take out,
when i compare it with some Accumulator with ie 2 Ah, they give up steady
about ie 12V, but after the Amperage are down, the Accumulator will drop at the Voltage too.
And actually it is, what the Description says,
support a Voltage from 12V at a Load with 1 Ah for 2h.
So it is actually hard to say, how much Energy is taken out from the Run Batterie, to charge the Load,
because first do go the Amperage with the same Load steady down, and then the Voltage.
It is like a Ballon, what blows with a certain strength Air out,
and at a Point, it does loose at Size(Voltage).

[ibpointless2]

Found out that this design works great for charging non rechargeable alkaline batteries. I also know you’re not supposed to recharge them but this is not a typical charger where the battery gets warm when charging which cause them to leak or explode. This charger never gets hot or warm and it put a real charge in the batteries. But the bad news is that it is slow, about 100 milli volt gain a day. Still not bad considering the price of rechargeable batteries or even the price of by any battery! Plus it saves on the land fills too!

Also I should point out that the positive of the run battery actually goes to the positive of the solar panel wire on the board. I also do now a bedini style of feeding the negative to positive.

Does anyone know where I can get a 1.5 volt power outlet? radio shack only goes to 3 volts. I really want to make a more permeant setup using a “wall wart” so I can let my non rechargeable batteries recharge while not consuming another battery. And if you do this make sure you check daily if not hourly the battery voltage.

[SkyWatcher]

Hi folks, Hi ibpointless2, regarding charging primary non-rechargeable cells with JTC or similar. What I have found through experiments, is that though you can recharge them a few times and it does seem there is a limit as to how many recharges they will take before losing capacity, be aware that in my flashlights they started to leak and kinda messed up the inside battery bay of the flashlights. It could be that they leak under a load that is too high for them, maybe they would not leak if the load was smaller. Hope that helps.
peace love light
Tyson

[sucahyo]

My only problem charging non rechargeable is with alkaline. I usually forget it and charge it half an hour too long and it pop. Once it pop, it reduce charge.

I am having less problem with zinc carbon. Although their charge only last for weeks or only recover small capacity, it still better than having to buy battery.

I think 100mV a day is too weak for a charger. Raise the input to 500mA or so by reducing coil impedance.

[ibpointless2]

My only problem charging non rechargeable is with alkaline. I usually forget it and charge it half an hour too long and it pop. Once it pop, it reduce charge.

I am having less problem with zinc carbon. Although their charge only last for weeks or only recover small capacity, it still better than having to buy battery.

I think 100mV a day is too weak for a charger. Raise the input to 500mA or so by reducing coil impedance.

They've been running for days without any pop, or any noise, or any type of heat. I think the 100 mV a day is the right way to go because any higher and the battery will pop or leak like you say yours do. And i can't change the coil because there is no coil, it just a simple garden light circuit thats been slightly modified. Plus i don't mind waiting a week to recharge some batteries if they'll last me a month. The low power is key in recharging Alkaline batteries, you can't rush these things to do something that they don't normally do.

[NickZ]

Guys:
I have been having to use non rechargeable AAs for my Jt. circuits as I couldn't find any rechargeables where I live (Costa Rica). I can say that there are some makes of regular AAs that can take the charge from the Jt much better, and work cool, and run longer than others. But, today I bought a rechargeable wireless phone battery that is rated at 3.7 volts, so I'm going to continue my Jt coil testing using that as a charge battery that receives about 2.5 volts from a tiny solar panel during the day, and can run a Jt to light up some Leds at night. Later I'll see if I can make the Jt to self charge during the day, and run itself and the Leds at nights without the solar panels help. I think that it's possible... but I'd like to see it for myself to belive it.
If there's anybody with a self running and charging Jt, especially one that uses only One Battery, I'd like to hear about it.
NickZ

[SkyWatcher]

Hi folks, Hi Nick, yes that's what I'm testing out now in my solar joule thief thread, others as well as myself have noticed it's tricky to get good solid charge that's not fluffy when using the same voltage input as charging battery voltage, in this case 1.2volt AA input, charging 1.2volt AA output. The only way to ever know for yourself is experiment or replicate what others say may work. That's why I'm experimenting with a large capacitor in parallel to try and on the fly convert some of the radiant to more proper charging current, then the next alternative would be cap dump into the charge battery, which of course makes the circuit more complicated. Oh and what I said about charging the primary non-rechargeables, I meant i never had one pop on me with bedini or JT radiant charging, it was just later in use that they leaked, possibly because I was loading them too much. Hope that helps anyone.
peace love light
Tyson

[sucahyo]

They've been running for days without any pop, or any noise, or any type of heat. I think the 100 mV a day is the right way to go because any higher and the battery will pop or leak like you say yours do. And i can't change the coil because there is no coil, it just a simple garden light circuit thats been slightly modified. Plus i don't mind waiting a week to recharge some batteries if they'll last me a month. The low power is key in recharging Alkaline batteries, you can't rush these things to do something that they don't normally do.

While low current charging reduce the chance of bubbling, when your alkaline gets full it will bubble eventually.

Make sure that your charger can charge with more than alkaline max voltage. For instance, mine usually charge with voltage higher than battery voltage. Nicad can be charged between 1.6V to 2.4V depend on state of charge.

[ibpointless2]

While low current charging reduce the chance of bubbling, when your alkaline gets full it will bubble eventually.

Make sure that your charger can charge with more than alkaline max voltage. For instance, mine usually charge with voltage higher than battery voltage. Nicad can be charged between 1.6V to 2.4V depend on state of charge.

Well I don’t fully charge them. Brand new the battery reads about 1.600 volts, while I only recharge them to about 1.400 volts. It all seems to good so far, and i’m sure results have to do with the joule thief in the solar garden lights being so efficient. But thanks for the heads up

[ibpointless2]

I’m still playing with this circuit along with all my others but I still find this one most interesting. Some say the Joule thief is overunity, but I don’t believe that it is. I believe the overunity shows in the batteries. I’ve been running this circuit for a while and for sure every time the charge battery gains more in it then what was took out of the run battery. The best part it does it with alkaline batteries, and rechargeable batteries too.

So instead of the same old setup I made another advancement to it. I’ve added the solar panel that came with the solar garden light and I put it face down onto the LED as to keep any stray room light away from it and too much voltage good damage the circuit. It out puts about .180 volts so I feed that to the run battery. The run battery had 1.314 volts and it jump up to 1.315! Now more energy will feed back into the charge battery and even more charging! And I know what some people might point out is that the solar panel may still be picking up stray room light, even though it still outputs power in a completely dark room, I say big deal. I’m not putting the solar panel in direct light it is facing down onto the LED and too much light could damage the circuit due to the excess power. So if a little extra room light comes in by the milli volt the no big deal, I say if the energy is their why not use it? Light is a type of radiant energy just there waiting to be taken! with the lights on its .180 volts, turn the lights out its .171 volts, so the room lights are just adding .009 volts so no big deal.

[ibpointless2]

A thought came to mind when I was thinking about a joule thief as being overunity. At best the joule thief can be 80 percent efficient and that may sound discouraging but if you think about it, it is really good.

For example let say a battery has a 100 percent full charge on it and you run it through a joule thief charger you may only get 80 percent of that 100 percent put in the charge battery and thus people may say it is not overunity because it has not gain over 100 percent but that could be further from the truth. They have gain 180 percent because that 80 percent can now replace the run battery and continue doing the work so the battery 100 percent gets added to the 80 percent left over. What ever load it was doing it can do it for 80 percent longer.

Apply this to modern day things you can make the original battery last longer after its has performed its load, just like what a joule thief charger does. So instead of a 100 amp hour battery you now have a 180 amp hour battery. Or use the run battery to charge a super capacitor and when the run battery gets low switch to super cap to give you that extra 80 percent in an electronic device such as a phone. Don’t waste the power like modern day electronics due, recycle it! By recycling it you have gain over 100 percent more energy to do work. Thus some might say “Overunity”.

[ibpointless2]

My Joule thief charger circuit that runs on non rechargeable AA batteries is still going after a month. I've had to swap the run battery to charge battery and vise versa because the charge battery reached 1.500 volts. The batteries don't get hot nor does the simple modified solar garden light circuit. It just sits in my room on my desk work 24/7 with a glowing red LED. Makes me wonder how long will it really run for?

I find it really a amazing because a simple modification to the circuit has let me run a LED for a month non stop, but before when it was just a plain solar garden light circuit it could barely run a LED for 2 days without any sun light getting to the solar panel. But now it runs even better with the modification and the solar panel removed. It just sits there glowing at me non stop, never taking a break and the non rechargeable alkaline batteries show no sign of leaking or exploding, heck they are cold to the touch! Amazing!