Dr Stiffler SEC Replications?

[ashtweth]

he appears to have taken a holiday now that we have finally figured out what's going on in his circuit.
i don't blame him one bit.

Hi Amigo, Ben, Doc and ALL

what a great and needed document Ben thank you so much, after a visit we had with Ben i can certainly say his work is going to spark a lot of interest into the SEC and gave us a lot of tips and stuff to sink our teeth in, we hope to produce some thing to get more people looking into the PSEC starting at the end of Jan. Thank you so much Ben for your hard work on this , it was needed.

Ash

[kcarring]

We may be able use a regular AM radio 512pF for 13MHz !

I found the 0-500 pF variable capacitor very useful with the circuit, and will be including one with your solar panels I am sending you tomorrow or the next day brother :P

[Slider2732]

@kcarring

Am building up that SW 13MHz version at the moment.
My intention, was to see if KRMG broadcast CoasttoCoastAM and I could listen to that via own made radio instead of online. But within mucking about discovered something else. If you saw my 'doob coil' it works great on the aerial input
The doob coil, is a 1/2 A4 sheet of paper and same size of aluminium foil. Roll it up and put 1 wire in the middle, 1 wire in the outside most aluminium. In this configuration it will be a fixed value capacitor.

Also, have found a reallllly good little signal meter method that can be used with PSEC's most likely.
I found an audio analog meter from a junked CB, with 'Signal' written on the face. Put it in line between the diode and one speaker connection. It raises to 1 out of 5 on the scale and sits quite solidly. By moving the tuning cap, the meter level raises and lowers and volume isn't affected.

[Lidmotor]

Radio Quest

@Slider
I am doing almost the exact same crystal radio research that you are. This was a good idea. I am learning and relearning lots. That "Science Toys" web site has been a great help. The last few days I worked on the LM chip amplifier for the crystal radio and succeeded. I have also ordered parts to build a version of his "Three Penny Radio".
Today I was able to run my radio (with the home built amplifier) using a big tall Slayer Exciter coil as the antenna and no ground wire.
That 13Mz SW radio looks interesting. If you get yours working I may stop what I am doing and build one.
I don't really know if this is going to help us with PSEC understanding or not ---but it sure has been alot of fun. I was getting ready to make a video today of what I was doing but my wife decided that going out to dinner and a movie was a better idea. She was right.

Cheers,

Lidmotor

[kcarring]

@lidmotor and @slider2732

Did you ever see the one of the guy blaring an LED off his crystal radio?

The circuit:

Pixie Schematic

Won't be doing it with a tiny coil, by the looks of it, but still kind of cute, nonetheless :P

[Slider2732]

@kcarring - erm yes squire, I linked to it above hehe
It's exactly the route y'see...get the LED lighting, decrease the aerial length and improve the signal strength. A different route and yet the same in a number of ways. In time, it may be possible to run a SEC or Slayer from a crystal receiver. I'm sure that guy in the video could.

@Lidmotor - It's cool huh, a revisit to something I never did in the first place
Ah yes, I saw the The Three Penny, actually built on 3 penny coins. Very cool project.
I believe this route to be very valid. Anyone who tinkers in these ways will quickly learn about tunings, the same tunings of capacitance, distance, interaction and subtlety that may be troublesome without a spectrum analyser etc. Actually hearing those tunings is invaluable ! And, if we can get to work with 13MHz possibilities from the very same radio, well it might be a wondrous thing.

Speaking of wondrous - the linked to modified Short Wave version of the Mystery does indeed work !!!!
And i'll tell ya what, i'm receiving Nashville, Tennessee !!!!
Reception somewhat floats around in a cyclic 20 seconds or so in and out of reception, but it's the wondrous thing of the day lol
A mystery of this Mystery is the L1...it connects to nothing, open contacts. BUT, when you short the two wires of the L1 together, the receiver stops working
The guy in my earphone said about WWCR and I couldn't find it in a list of Oklahoma stations, so carried on listening to what was some preacher type chap who is destined for a very sore throat. He said 'go to Overcome Ministry online for more details'. OK, so I did, but not for the reasons I guess he was intending.
In the list of affiliates was WWCR - out of TN.
Just researching their transmitter at the moment. Talk about wireless range though huh, in a way, sort of
569 miles of wireless electric power to a batteryless receiver.
"WWCR has four 100,000 Watt, state of the art, transmitters"

Here's my setup, built on a stone kitchen counter type thing of a square.


So, in summary, it's a different frequency band, smaller coil and further distance capable. Nothing of interest for anything with a battery, but there aint one
Oh, the best part about this receiver, is that the Ground connection doesn't seem to be needed. Made not a jot of difference, whether connected or not !

[Lidmotor]

FM crystal radio

@Slider
I found this neat little FM crystal radio here:

FM Crystal Radio

I have terrible FM reception where I live and none of my homemade FM radio receiver circuits have worked so far. This Crystal FM radio would probably not work for me either BUT----- I have been able to build a simple FM transmitter and this FM crystal radio might pick up that. I'm trying to go both directions (transmitters and receivers) in an effort to better understand Dr. Stiffler's circuits. It is all about resonance in tank circuits and in some of the designs that I have studied-- the receiver and transmitter circuits are almost the same. This might relate to why a SEC can pick up a signal and run itself. I don't know. Everytime I turn around I discover something new and interesting on this hunt for the elusive and seldom seen PSEC beast.

Lidmotor

[Slider2732]

I tried that one a couple of months back as a flunker..but will return to it.
Mine flunked, probably because only 2 of my telephone handset speakers actually work with crystal sets. Piezo elements from greetings cards/watches do work great, but need a definite sound chamber and won't work noticeably when held in the hand. All of which was unknown before actually building a running crystal set the other day.
There is another FM capable circuit out there (maybe more), a little more complicated, but apparently with workable results. So, just to say, it does seem like another circuit to gain learning enjoyment from
Ideally, and you might see this as a good idea I hope, we can put all receiving capabilities into 1 device. A full range receiver, which will probably have what looks to be a small Tesla tower as coil, with spacings between what would normally be a continuous wire. A full range transmitter would be the companion. We move then from audio to actual power transfer - replace the speaker with an LED, then a series LED bank and LOA 2W bulbs. Then twiddle parameters until the transmitter switches off and the circuit continues to work. Just my idea of progression of this

What attracted me to the FM circuit in your link, was the lack of need for a ground and that the aerial was so much smaller...it's into SEC circuit design territory, if you picture the requirements of components.
Along this route, i'm sure that fellows like yourself and I will twig through experiences that Dr. Stiffler has designed, in an exacting fashion, units that make excellent RF sense. We know they do, but perhaps not why they do.
We can't know what we're looking at til we hear or see the differences and by doing so, I believe we could well end up with something that has more than a passing similarity to a Dr. Stiffler SEC !
If we look at how the Slayer circuits evolved and how GBluer himself continues to improve his baby, such dedication brings about such circuits in the first case. Noone can replace 40 years of RF experience, but with a focus and the people here as a team, we may get a firm handle on this project.

Relating to that, is pigtails.
If anyone builds the SW Mystery set, you'll see that L1 has no connections to anything, a floating coil with nothing connecting. Weird huh. It stops the whole circuit if the ends are connected together, the running changes with proximity of the L1 to the other coils and with different pigtail lengths.
(a tip for L1 - put clear packing tape first onto the piece of pipe form, secure the windings with hotglue just on themselves. The coil can then be moved away and nearer to the other coils, as mentioned in the write up where he felt that the loose coupling of 1/2" may be an issue.)
I wanted to tidy the coil and snipped the ends of the L1. The receiver quit completely. I added 2 pieces back on, but somewhat longer than originals and it still didn't work. So I carefully measured and cut them to be exactly the same lengths as each other and guess what, reception came back !
For all the 80ft of aerial outside and all the windings etc, everything is within matching the pigtail lengths of the physically unconnected L1 !
I believe that is what happened to kcarrings circuit when he snipped back the pigtail.

Btw, what would you recommend I do for an amplifier for when making videos ? I don't really wish to plug this into the PC or something and got no standalone iPod amplifier here. Would like to build at maximum a 1.2V audio amp.

[Slider2732]

"By jove I think he's got it"

Relating to tuned crystals earlier in this thread, check out: Make Your Own Low-Power AM Radio Transmitter

Simple in theory.
Make the transmitter as described, send audio from a CD player etc to a crystal set. Have the crystal a socket type on a breadboard and then slot in a 13MHz.
Tadaa !
A known tuned 13MHz source. An easy build for the transmitter, which 'features' a short range for non FCC worrying.
Tuning has to be better than approximate and is in the right area straight away.

[Lidmotor]

Amplified Crystal Radio

@Slider & All
I made a short video of my progress to this point with the radio research.
This shows a simple crystal radio circuit coupled to the LM386 amplifier chip circuit. Using this "powered" approach I was able to drive a speaker. My stupid simple radio still only gets one AM strong station.

Amplified Crystal Radio with and without ground wire.ASF - YouTube


@Slider
I started amplifing the signal with the darlington pair trick that was shown on that site but it really didn't do much. The LM386 chip circuit is the one to use to get a x200 boost.Chapter 10: Computers and Electronics -- Build a simple integrated circuit amplifier The downside is that you need a little more than 3 volts and 5mAs to make it run. I have been hoping to find a circuit that will run on 1 volt and 1 mA so I can use one of the homemade cells that we have made.
What I am seeing so far is what I already knew----to get more out of something you have to pay for it with more power. At some point we are going to have to stop and relalize that this is NOT how a SEC works. If we follow standard radio theory too far we may go blind to what Dr. Stiffler has worked so hard developing.
We might uncover something different by accident as we stumble along. That would be a really good day.


Lidmotor

[Slider2732]

amplifying the signals from electric fish

Now there's an energy source for contemplation.
Current limiting on LM386's, ah, have just thrown a 10uF cap across the pins before now. 5ma is very good news...thought it was way higher.

We might well be on a wrong course, still, better tried than not and there are parallels
As a start for free powering of at least something it's a good route. It's not free, in terms of radio stations whomping megawatts out into the sky, but to my mind can either go through my mind or be stopped and turned into something useful. Same with cellphones and more.

[Lidmotor]

Wave Trap

@ Slider
I have been looking at the "Wave Trap" coil that you mentioned and that is my next build. The more that I looked into what that coil is doing and how it is doing it-- the more I think that it relates to Dr. Stiffler's "3 coil" setup. Here is a link to another home brew radio site that shows a 3 coil wave trap arrangement. Scroll to the bottom of the page to see the arrangement.

Dave's Homemade Wave-Trap. Suck out those local stations that make your DXing suck!


There is an L1, L2, and L3 coil ------Hummmm---sound familiar?

This might be a wild goose chase but it sure is interesting.

Lidmotor

[kcarring]

@Lidmotor

I was curious whether at times, when you experimented with the Dr.s circuit, was your setup so sensitive that your hand, approaching even 10-12" away from your main output coil, completely dimmed or effected the circuit? I had this effect, yet once I blew the high gain in the transistor... it was gone, the overal performance diminished, the whole effect pretty much dead (more like a slayer circuit in that you'd need to almost pretty much touch coils to see effect.) I showed this in my video, too.

Which brings me to the LED and diode configuration on the E-B junction. All I have seen in the way of circuits is what jonnydavro has up on a few newer vids. I tried to put a LED across with its' positive on E --->|---- B. It killed operation. So, I'm pretty sure I saw somewhere that you incorporate diodes with the LED, too, and I think I'm missing those. Could someone point me to that technique, if in fact this is all about protecting the transistor as I seem to be killing mine... and I go through many transistors to find a high gain one, to begin with... seems to be the only way I get it to work. I did finally figure out how to calculate AL from an unknown core, to then calculate how many winds to turn to get a desired inductance, for that same core, tho... so that's handy.


Cheers All

PS The skiing is very good right now in BC, i am on the mountain in the sun, shredding up the powder, life is very good at the moment LOL

[Slider2732]

@Lidmotor
The wave trap works well, it was used as a method to deviate from always only receiving WBIX. That station has less power output than the lowliest microwave oven at 450W, but sits across the train tracks from the house.
Moving to the SW set, range is now 569 miles, yet, always i'm actually wishing to bring in each and every signal all at the same time - who cares what it sounds like in PSEC experiments, it has to wave trap in an opposite way - bring in everything. I'll be hunting for a selectivity of zero with high gain in further experiments.

Thoughts turn to the L3 and how Dr. Stiffler used an actual AM loopstick in early builds. He wound the 9 turns on top and it works great. Do those turns have a trapping function ?
Also, look at the winding of a L2...comparatively a big gauge and something perhaps akin to the larger wire across the variable tuning cap. Which, of course, the SEC 18X features too. Has he shown an axial inductor L2 in PSEC video's ?
I'm wondering about an L3, to conventional newer build sizings like on the SEC 18X, with Mystery crystal radio bifilar winding.
Also wishing to further look into everything of Tesla's Patents again, in a new light. After all, wireless and radio are his pioneered forte. Although todays radio broadcasts don't use the perfected Earth transmission method, it's every bit related to his work.

Btw, check this out: AntennaSearch - Search for Cell Towers, Cell Reception, Hidden Antennas and more.
You can see each and every cellphone tower and radio tower in a 4 mile radius from your address (or any address entered)
Each tower can be clicked on to show not only the output power, but what type of signal is emitted, the tower height and the frequency !!!!
I think I heard about it on CoasttoCoast last night, though, it was a late night and my brain signals must be tuning in and out like WWCR in Nashville


@kcarring. Skiing the slopes eh, while us lot are slope tuning
I know you'll do well with the actual 18X circuit !
Check out: Early 18x Documentation Release
It has a ton of info on the 18X and the circuit, with explanations of functions.
On the 18X, you have the negative rail connecting to the positive of the white LED, then 2x 1N4148's lead up from that end to end, to the Base of the transistor. Also connected to the Base is one side of the 1Meg resistor.
White LED, because, the tunings of a 'factory' 18X will change with different LED's...something I wish to find out more about the properties of.


Found a genuine oldy worldy metal cased 2N2222A last night
Am intending to see if there is a difference to a regular plastic new fangled one.

[NickZ]

@Slider and All:
Thanks for the info on the 18x board, that is very much needed to help better understand the workings of that circuits, and to make any future home made replications or modifications possible.
It makes me wonder if using the small chokes instead of the wound coils offers any advantages, besides the fixed value, and no guessing involved. Or do the hand wound L1 -L3 coils and their tuned pigtails perform better???
Are the pigtails acting as the antenna, and the L3 coil itself acting as an antenna tuning coil. I'm still trying to figure this out...

Would be great to see an available Passive SEC version PCB, as well as the 30 watt version that has been mentioned. Matter of time?

The following has nothing to do with the Dr. Stiffler type circuits, but I thought that it was interesting to note, for those that would like to have a ready made oscillator boast circuit to experiment with, can also finally do so. This was not available a year or two ago, at least not that I know of.
Joule Thief Boost Circuit

NickZ