Joule Ringer!

[FRC]

Partial success

Just fried the transistor on my third Fuji attempt. This one was AA. Was able to find one finally. Someone previously posted that you could not get them anymore. The one I used is a "Presidents Choice" disposable. When I saw them before I decided to do a search on the web. Turned out that they are Fuji's with the Presidents Choice rebranding. So I tried to do the mod that was shown in the video that was posted for me previously in this thread. It is not very clear in the video where you place the leads to the CFL. Also it is important to not break the connection to the neon from where the flash was connected. This was not stressed in the video either. After realizing why the neon would not light and temporarily resolving it, I managed to light the CFL for a couple seconds before the fix came apart. Then after spending a lot of time to secure the neon connection, I could not remember where the leads were supposed to go and shorted something causing sparks and nothing seemed to work anymore. It would be nice if Seth would answer whether the IRF 830 transistors will work with these transformers or not. Guess will just have to buy another camera.

Lucky grocery stores in California used to sell President's Choice products
before Albertson's took them over, and I hear that Lucky stores are back.
These President's Choice disposable AA camera's are available In Canada
at Superstore and Extra Foods.

Does anyone have a clear picture or diagram of where the leads are supposed to go on the Fuji circuit ? It would sure help for my next attempt.

FRC

[whacky0]

Remove the large cap. Attach the cfl to the middle transformer pin that goes to the black diode (AA Fuji model). The other side of the cfl can just go to negative battery terminal.

[whacky0]

FRC, the only components on the fuji circuit that are needed to light a cfl are the transformer, transistor and resistor.

[FRC]

Thanks whackyO

Remove the large cap. Attach the cfl to the middle transformer pin that goes to the black diode (AA Fuji model). The other side of the cfl can just go to negative battery terminal.

That clears it up. Maybe will not burn out the next one now. Have been trying to replace the transistor on this one. But everything is so small and have not found one I have that works yet. I hope you meant the large transformer.

Does that also mean that you do not have to remove the small transformer or the flash unit
"Remove the large cap" ?

FRC

[whacky0]

yes large transformer with 5 pins. The smaller one is a trigger coil for flashing the xenon. If you have any AAA models, you can use those transistors here if you have a steady hand, and they work about the same. Many other transistors will work but the gain is different, so they're not as sensitive in this circuit powered with 1.5V unless maybe in a darlington arragement. If you live in Canada, try walmart or london drugs photo department. They've both given me free cams.

[whacky0]

[QUOTE=FRC;130921]Does that also mean that you do not have to remove the small transformer or the flash unit
"Remove the large cap" ?/QUOTE]
Remove the black electrolytic capacitor. You don't need to remove anything else, but those other parts are not required.

[skaght]

joule ringer with custom transformer

I got the joule ringer to work with a homemade transformer similar to what lasersaber used (ICH-OP45224-KIT) from Surplus sales of nebraska. I wound the E core first with 30 gauge, approximately 1200 winds CW (I used my drill to shorten the laborious winding, however, I couldn't count very accurately since it spun so quickly). Then 12 turns of 20 gauge in series with the first coil and 5 turns of 20 gauge CCW as the primary. The core squeals in use pretty loudly, although it works. It might be slightly less efficient than the smaller camera coils, but you should really be able to use higher input voltages. I also discovered that using 1/8" thick, 1/2" diameter ceramic magnets holds the core together tightly and stops the squealing. I was thrilled to build my own working transformer for this circuit!

I didn't use a bifilar, I used a capacitor in parallel with resistor. Transistor was MJE13007.

[FRC]

Thanks again whakyO

yes large transformer with 5 pins. The smaller one is a trigger coil for flashing the xenon. If you have any AAA models, you can use those transistors here if you have a steady hand, and they work about the same. Many other transistors will work but the gain is different, so they're not as sensitive in this circuit powered with 1.5V unless maybe in a darlington arragement. If you live in Canada, try walmart or london drugs photo department. They've both given me free cams.

I do live in Canada. Wal Mart told me they recycle them. I asked my sister to
check both Wal Mart and London Drugs in Calgary and they both told her the same. I do have the AAA but I thought I burnt out that transistor too. Will
try it on the AA circuit.

FRC

[aaron5120]

Homemade transformer

I got the joule ringer to work with a homemade transformer similar to what lasersaber used (ICH-OP45224-KIT) from Surplus sales of nebraska. I wound the E core first with 30 gauge, approximately 1200 winds CW (I used my drill to shorten the laborious winding, however, I couldn't count very accurately since it spun so quickly). Then 12 turns of 20 gauge in series with the first coil and 5 turns of 20 gauge CCW as the primary. The core squeals in use pretty loudly, although it works. It might be slightly less efficient than the smaller camera coils, but you should really be able to use higher input voltages. I also discovered that using 1/8" thick, 1/2" diameter ceramic magnets holds the core together tightly and stops the squealing. I was thrilled to build my own working transformer for this circuit!

I didn't use a bifilar, I used a capacitor in parallel with resistor. Transistor was MJE13007.

@skaght,
Congrats! Buddy. I also got the core kit from Nebraska, and glad to hear someone had had success with the winding of the coil. I wonder how you tackle with the arcing when the trafo is given more than 10V input into its primary for more than 30 minutes of operation.
The thousands and something turns of secondary is the problematic winding, which must have some sort of isolation in each layer to prevent the arcing. So many isolation layers do make the secondary become very bulky and the primary windings to be very far away from the ferrite core. Anyway, how many minutes of cfl lighting have you got with only the cap as the power source with this trafo? Can you take some pictures of your setup please?
aaron5120

[skaght]

2nd transformer

The first transformer, I didn't separate layers. It worked, but obviously not ideal. I wound a second transformer on the same style E-core with 36 gauge, eight layers separated by electrical tape (approx. 1400 windings), then 13 windings 24 gauge in series and the 24 gauge primary wound opposite 5 times. The transformer is more efficient than my last one. My current usage is 10 mA at 5 volts to get my tube flickering, when I used to be able to get it to go at a couple mA with the camera trigger X-former. So I don't expect amazing run times with my current setup yet...

[ltseung888]

COP measurements

Has anybody done the comparison of Output Energy to Input Energy on the Joule Ringer yet?

[cikljamas]

flyback cfl

Has anyone tried to light cfls with flybacks ?
I was playing today with flyback, tried few flyback drivers and
got this result :
ImageShack® - Online Photo and Video Hosting

These arcs are nice thing to play with, but some more useful purpose
for using flybacks would be much more eligible in my opinion.

I saw yesterday just one example of lighting few cfls with flyback, but
that guy didnt explain which flyback driver he use for that, so i am
wondering if flyback drivers are convenient for cfl lightening at all
regarding maybe to large HV output ?

[FRC]

Same here

There are previous posts about flybacks, but I am still nor clear on it either. Could someone help. I do have a flyback but it has 13 contacts and the
one shown in the circuit before only had 10.

FRC

[FRC]

cikljamas

Originally Posted by xee2 View Post
I have not made any new Joule ringer circuits. This is a basic flyback circuit.

YouTube - EG flyback 12V

cikljamas here is xee2's flyback circuit. I just took apart a small 12v TV. It has a mini flyback with 10 contacts like the Goldmine one. Maybe will work with
this circuit also.

FRC

[cikljamas]

Hi FRC !
If you want to play with flyback drivers you should see this page :
_-= Uzzors2k =-_ Project Site

I made this Eriks flayback driver and my arcs from the picture in
my previous post has been produced by using a little bit modified
that particular driver, but i am going to make in a few days that
other one designed by Vladimiro Mazzilli, and that must be something...

Only : beware of high voltage, it is never enough warnings of that !!!