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**citfta** · 05-12-2013, 04:49 PM

Not a standard SSG!

Hi Crazy Uncle Jay,

Well first thing is you do not have a standard SSG. At least not according to the info put out by John Bedini. You are supposed to be using plain old ceramic magnets with a grade 8 or so rating, NOT neos. You also posted you are using steel rods for the core. You are supposed to be using soft iron or R60 welding rods. And you are supposed to be using a bike wheel not a scooter wheel. Although the scooter wheel will work it will be harder to tune to the sweet spot. And lastly you are supposed to be using a NE2 neon bulb which is rated for 60 to 70 volts not 120 volts. This is probably the reason you are blowing the transistors. The neon is the protection for the transistor and using a higher rated one will cause the transistor to blow if the charge battery is disconnected.

Now I guess the real question is why are you trying to run it with the charge battery disconnected? Even with the correct neon bulb you still risk blowing the transistor every time you disconnect the charge battery with the SSG running. You are not supposed to run it with the charge battery disconnected. Not ever. We all forget sometimes and accidentally connect the wrong wire first but you should never intentionally run the SSG without the charge battery connected.

Respectfully, Carroll

**CrazyUncleJay** · 05-12-2013, 05:15 PM

thanks

wow, I feel like I just got yelled at.....
I do thank you for the advise. Here I went out and bought a jumbo bulb thinking it would use more electric once I got to the 120v, when I needed to have it start consuming at a lower voltage. Ill get the ne2.

I have also built a newman motor and am trying to use the bedini to power the newman motor. I just finished building the SSG and wanted to see that it was running well. I just HAD to disconnect the charging battery and make the bulb light up, I now also know exactly what it looks like when the transistor gets fried.

I want to be able to switch the charging side of the circuit from battery to battery or over to another load of some sort(newman motor).that is why I am running it with the charging batter disconnected at times.

thanks again for steering in the right direction.

**citfta** · 05-12-2013, 07:03 PM

Sorry

Hi again,

I did not mean to come across that strongly that you felt I was yelling at you. I am sorry I expressed myself that way. I was just trying to point out why you might have some problems getting things to work well. Also there are some people that have experience with the SSG that won't even try to help you if you are using Neo magnets instead of the suggested ceramics. The circuit does actually work better with the right parts. I have built several of them.

If you want to switch from one charge battery to another there are couple of things you can do. First and most simple is to just turn off the power to the SSG while switching charge batteries. Another thing you can do is connect a large value capacitor in parallel with the charge battery and never disconnect the capacitor only the battery while swapping charge batteries. A capacitor of 10,000 to 20,000 uf at 50 to 75 volts rating should work fine. You just have to be sure and make the change fairly quickly so you don't overcharge the capacitor while there is no charge battery in the circuit.

Respectfully, Carroll

**CrazyUncleJay** · 05-12-2013, 07:51 PM

Thank you again. I am actually starting to see that the smaller weaker magnets work better. I tried putting bigger and more powerful ones on there and the stronger the magnet the more cogging I seem to get and the rpms go down.
I have another question... say if I wanted to charge 4 12v batteries and connected them in parallel to the charging side of the circuit would it work with just one power battery? Also is it possible to then put an inverter on the batteries currently being charged and run some household things off of it while charging?
I DO appreciate your advice and thanks for taking the time to answer my posts. I am a beginner and have watched just about every utube video I could find on the subject and am still running into problems that are not answered in the videos. Im glad I could atleast get the thing to work but I was hitting a brick wall trying to find answers to some questions.

**citfta** · 05-12-2013, 08:03 PM

Forum just for Bedini stuff

Hi again,

There is a forum just for the technology of John Bedini. Here is the link:

Energy Science Forum

This forum has several sections to it and has sections on swapping batteries and a lot of other info.

Your single coil is much too small to charge 4 other batteries at the same time unless they were very small batteries. It also is much too small to maintain a charge on a battery if you were trying to use the battery to run an inverter at the same time. Actually John Bedini recommends you never try to use and charge a battery at the same time. The web site I gave you a link to shows you how to build much bigger units that will charge larger batteries and even multiple batteries at the same time.

Respectfully,
Carroll

**CrazyUncleJay** · 05-14-2013, 01:54 PM

Ok ... Ive changed over to 4 ceramic magnets and cant seem to find r60 at home depot. Is there a good subsitute i can find there. Its the only place near me that i can get parts like what would be needed to build a standard ssg. After thinking about it .... I am going to step back and try following what is supposed to be done. After all i do want to learn here and this seems to be the best site so i cant show up to class with a stapiler and the teacher said bring a paperclip. Tell me what i need to do to get on bord here. By the way .... It does run much better having changed out the magnets

**citfta** · 05-14-2013, 02:39 PM

Hello again Jay,

You can use any soft iron wire that doesn't retain magnetism after the coil turns off. I have been using electric fence wire for most of my builds and it seems to work OK. To test what you have just hold a magnet to one end and try and pick up something with the other end. It should pick up a paper clip or some other small metal object. When you remove the magnet the object should fall off. If the object sticks after removing the magnet from the wire or rod then the material is not suitable for the SSG. In other words it should be easy to magnetize but should also lose the magnetism easily. Your rods may work if they are iron and not steel.

Later, Carroll

**CrazyUncleJay** · 05-14-2013, 03:37 PM

My coil "cap" is 1/4in thick slice of a wooden dowel. That makes my coils 1/4in further away from the magnets than the core rods. Is it better to use a thinner piece or do i want the rods to be closer to the magnet than the coil

**citfta** · 05-16-2013, 09:48 AM

Hi again,

Sorry for the slow response. I have been very busy lately. Most of us use plastic spools for our coil forms which allows us to have the coil closer to the magnets and closer to the end of the core. However we have also found and the Bedini info agrees there is a spot where the charging is better and the system more efficient that is not with the coil and core as close as possible to the magnets. This adjustment is another one of the things you can do to make a better system. My cores usually stick out about 1/8th of an inch past my plastic spool. Then I adjust the coil distance from the magnets until I get the best charging. This is usually about 3/16th of an inch from the end of the core to the magnet. The size and strength of the magnets will affect this distance. You may find with your system that a distance of 1/8th is better. I do believe you would see an improvement if you had the coil closer to the magnets by using a different coil form or spool. I am not sure if the improvement would be enough to make it worth the trouble as I have never tried building one with the coil 1/4th inch away from the end of the core. I use empty 1 pound solder spools for my forms and they seem to work pretty well.

Later,
Carroll

**CrazyUncleJay** · 05-17-2013, 02:11 AM

Ok i have a new problem. I keep blowing transisters. It was running fine the other day for hours on end. Now after replacing every part of the circut i seem to be blowing transisters every few min. Any thoughts?

**citfta** · 05-17-2013, 10:36 AM

Some ideas

Hello Uncle Jay,

There are some things you can look at to get an idea of what is going on. If there is a high resistance in the charge part of the circuit the spike will get very high in voltage. This will cause the transistor to blow if the neon has too high of a voltage rating and doesn't turn on quick enough. Did you change the neon to the NE2 which has a rating of about 60 to 70 volts? If your charge battery is highly sulfated it will also cause the spike to rise in voltage. Have you recently changed the charge battery? If you are seeing the neon come on at all you need to find out why. Another possibility is the diode from the bottom of the coil to the charge battery may have gone bad and if so you should see the neon flashing also. There is also the possibility the neon has gone bad and is no longer able to protect the transistor.

Do you have an ammeter that you could put in the circuit for test purposes? If you do you need to check and see how much current is flowing from the primary battery to the coil. If you don't have an ammeter you could put a fuse in the negative wire from the battery negative to the emitter of the transistor. An ammeter should show about 200 to 350 milliamps draw in a normal SSG. If you are going to use a fuse it should be rated about .5 amps slow blow to handle the surges. You do not want to leave either a meter or fuse in the circuit as they will affect the circuit a small amount but they will be fine while you try to figure out what is going on.

If the current draw is enough to blow the fuse or shows over an amp or so on the meter you have something wrong in the trigger circuit or you have a shorted coil. The most common problem is the pot or potentiometer. Cheap ones will short out especially if you have run the circuit without a charge battery in place. While it is running try adjusting the pot and watch the ammeter at the same time and see if it makes a difference.

You can kill transistors 2 ways. If you try to force too much current through it it will overheat and die. If the voltage spikes from any leg to any other leg are too high it will also kill the transistor. If you don't see any flashing of the neon and the transistor is still being blown and you don't have a meter or fuse you can also just put one finger on the transistor while it is running and see if it starts heating up. Just be careful and only use one finger on the transistor and don't touch anything else at the same time or you might get a little tingle. If built properly a SSG will NOT heat up the transistor. You don't even need a heat sink on it.

I hope these ideas help.

Carroll

**CrazyUncleJay** · 05-17-2013, 04:26 PM

It was the charge battery. I guess it was too dead and after i kept hooking it up and draining it , it finaly couldnt do it anymore. I switched to car batteries and am up and running. Thankyou for your help. Bedini motor up and running - YouTube
Here is what my motor looks like so far ... Any further help would be awsome. I am trying to get the parts to make it more standard so i can compair apples to apples. Thanks again

**citfta** · 05-17-2013, 06:30 PM

Draining battery

Hi again,

What do you mean when you say you drained the charge battery? If you mean you kept a load on it until it read near 0 volts you did kill it. When talking about 12 volt lead acid batteries drained means loading it until the voltage drops to about 12.2 volts. Then you recharge it. If you continue to do this without overloading the battery then the battery capacity should get better after several cycles. Deep cycle batteries can be taken a little lower. But you have to know what the manufacturer says. You also need to remember to discharge them at no more than what is called the C20 rate. Basicallly that means you load should be small enough so that it takes about 20 hours or so to discharge the battery down to 12.2 volts.

I am afraid you are going to be disappointed with those large batteries. A single coil SSG is not really big enough to charge those batteries in a reasonable time. It will take several days to charge one of those car batteries. A single coil SSG is just about right for small batteries like the little motorcycle batteries or a battery of about 7 to 10 ampere hour size.

Later,
Carroll

PS: You need to solder all your connections too to reduce the risk of something coming loose while the system is running. The only clamps I have on mine are the clamps for the batteries and they are just like yours.

**CrazyUncleJay** · 05-19-2013, 02:17 PM

Ok so ive got 18 magnets on a bike wheel and it does run. Ive seen videos where people have their wheel going at like 250 rpm. My wheel does not get close to that. The charging battery gets up to 13.18 and that is a good sign but there seems to be something happening when it runs. It almost seems like it finds its own sweet spot. Its going along everything look good and then it will pick up speed on its own without me touching the POT and then a minute later it goes back to how it was running. I do think i need a larger core and probobly more windings and i will get to them but do you have any ideas on what makes it run this way? Also ... I keep hearing about attraction mode. Is that something i should take a look at now or is that something for down the road

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