The nightlight in a box can use either one aaa battery or one aa battery. But whats really happening is that the battery voltage is no longer high enough for the device when its used directly. Its simple and cheap can even be assembled using parts from old cfl and incredibly easy to build. A battery is often considered dead when it cant power a particular device. The result show that the joulethief circuit able to supply led circuits up to 40.
The joule thief makes a great little light for field day, night light, camping light, and even one missionary intends to use them in africa. I assembled my joule thief in about 45 minutes, and i was taking my time. A suitable driver transistor, like the 2sd965, 2sc2500, 2sc2655 must be used. Aluminiumair batteries are also interesting they can be made from throwaway materials. I chose the older, more compact version, and it was easy and fun to build. Overunity joule thief the circuit has almost nothing to do with joule james, i just lie to remember him december 17, 20 getting it to work i s a lot easier than explaining why it wo rks 2 leonard teasca, bsc electrical engineering phone no.
Joule thief detailed construction north fulton amateur radio league. The joule thief circuit using solder islands cut from a wax paper cutting strip. The same reason goes for regulating the output voltage. The down side of this circuit is that there are conversion losses, but. Although this circuit is low power, it produces enough light to be a usable torch. A joule thief is a circuit that allows you to use the. The instructions were thorough and easy to understand. Joule thief led night light juneau economic development. How a joule thief works the joule thief aka blocking oscillator is an electronic circuit that allows you to make use of batteries normally considered dead. It can even take a battery that wont even power a basic led by itself when it is brand new 1. The pdf file that goes with the podcast is here 450 kb pdf file. Joule thief are small, fun circuits which exploit a few characteristics of electronics and leds in order to steal virtually all of the energy stored in a battery. The second winding has been replaced by a pnp 2n3906 and c1. Note that you do not need to write your logbook exactly like this one in order to get full marks.
The pdf file that goes with the podcast is here 450 kb pdf file so whatsa joule thief. Really, i think that nearly everyone interested in electronics have seen this circuit at least once. However, the led appears to be constantly lit to the human eye due to the persistence effect. What a joule thief cannot do is operate with very low voltage and current sources. The joule thief is a fascinating and simple circuit that is able to produce a usable voltage from a low voltage source. This is not possible with a simple joule thief circuit. The joule thief is such an easy and simple device, but what it does is amazing. Get the last bit of life from those supposedly dead batteries. The joule thief circuit puts a heavy demand on the transistor for high current at very low voltage. Since a pile of dying batteries keeps growing, i decided to give it a try. Its primary intent is to squeeze the remaining juice of dying batteries to light a led.
But now there are several very small 4 legged ics available that do the job using only a simple inductor, single cell battery and a led. Its not a complex circuit, but it really doesnt need the 2n3904. To get a positive outpit voltage youd need a voltage inverter circuit which is so comparatively complex it negates the use of a joule thief to harvest the last bit of energy from a battery. The transistor does affect how low the circuit runs to. So if a circuit can start up on less than that its stealing energy that would have been thrown away if the dead battery was put in the hazardous waste. An analysis of a joule thief circuit embedders life. To make a joule thief battery charger is a quick and easy project.
The joule thief allows you to squeeze the life out of what most people think of as dead batteries. The nightlight in a box, using either a dead aaa battery or a dead aa battery. In effect, the 4 legged ic replaces the clunky toroid. This cool sounding circuit is astonishingly simple just a coil which you could wind yourself, a resistor, and a transistor. In this weeks weekend projects video podcast, make magazines bre pettis and i show you how to make a joule thief. Joule thief kit this kit is a version of the popular joule thief circuit, it uses power that would normally be wasted from used aa batteries to power a bank of 6 hi brightness white leds. If you want to drive a larger led or two or more standard leds with more than 100 milliwatts, then you will need a higher current transistor specially made for switching very high current at very low. A joule thief is a selfoscillating voltage booster. Pdf joulethief circuit performance for electricity energy saving. Here is how a basic joule thief works, step by step.
Joule thug a joule thief bug bacteriophage hackaday. A single aluminiumair cell cannot produce a large enough voltage to drive an led, thats where the joule thief. In april 2005 i built a joule thief circuit is in my blog and at the bottom of this webpage that used both a 2n3904 bjt and a 2n7000 mosfet, with the 2n3904 starting the circuit and the 2n7000 then supplying most of the current. Theinstantmatrix talk contribs information description en1a regulated wjoule thief circuit with closedloop control and low drop out secondary regulator to power some voltage ripple sensitive circuit, like a microcontroller. Pretend for a moment, the battery in the moment isnt connected. A joule thief is a minimalist selfoscillating voltage booster that is small, lowcost, and easy to build, typically used for driving small loads. This week, windell oskay of evil mad scientist laboratories joins me to teach you how to make a super clever little circuit called the joule thief.
This page has two variations on the original design to use the simple circuit in a. This circuit used in this project is a modified joule thief. Heres what it looks like if you dont know how to read a. The advantage of using the joules thief circuit in this setup is that it will boost low voltages to higher usable voltages. Well, simply put, a joule thief is simply a circuit that utilizes the remaining. Joule thief very very very low input 0,035 volt by larskro. It can use a battery that is not usable in any other electronic device and give it life again. Jt joule thief circuits are usually poorly designed or not really designed or show signs that the people who produced them did not have a good understanding of what they were doing. Technically it may seem impossible to illuminate a 3. The peaks in voltage occur rapidly, causing the led to flash at a very fast rate. A highpower joule thief type circuit to drive a 1watt led from a 1. This circuit is also known by other names such as blocking oscillator, joule ringer, vampire torch it can use nearly all of the energy in a singlecell electric battery, even far below the voltage where other circuits consider the battery fully.
A suitable driver transistor, like the 2sd965, 2sc2500, 2sc2655 must. A single aluminiumair cell cannot produce a large enough voltage to drive an led, thats where the joule thief comes in. It has many implementations but probably most common is very minimalist voltage booster based on npn transistor, coil, resistor, and led. Jones while experimenting with a simple overunity concept. Theres also one change and thats to change the normal low power transistor for a. The led was connected in parallel or serial circuit configuration. There seems to be several variations of this nifty little circuit on the. I keep that battery around to find the shutdown voltage of the various joule thieves that i made. Joule thief circuit is popular among electronics enthusiasts. To be called a joule thief i think a circuit needs to be able to start when its input voltage is below 1. See more ideas about joule thief, joules and motor generator.
Is it possible to use ready made inductor, those that look like surface mount resistor. See more ideas about joule thief, electronics projects and diy electronics. A joule thief circuit is basically an efficient, selfoscillating voltage booster circuit, built using a single transistor, resistor and an inductor, which can boost voltages as low as 0. Make a joule thief this weekend, make a super little circuit called the joule thief. Pdf joulethief circuit performance for electricity. Joule thief circuits got a bad rap some time ago because some people in the overunity, freeenergy crowd went nuts over it, so lots of people wont really spend any time talking about it. It takes a steady low voltage signal and converts it into a series of high frequency pulses at a higher voltage. However, the led appears to be constantly lit to the human eye due to the.
Easy joule thief soldering kit from makersbox on tindie. Could be my circuit, but with the battery voltage at 0. This circuit can be most often seen lighting an led with an almost dead aa battery. That third coil and the cfl are the only additions to the regular joule thief circuit. It produces a similar amount of light as the led torch on a smartphone. The joule thief this following pages contain an example logbook that a student might have written while performing an experiment where they built a joule thief circuit.
Thats because one volt is one of the definitions of a dead single cell battery. I am in the process of building a battery charger this week and will put data about this project as i charge batteries. The joule thief aka blocking oscillator is an electronic circuit that allows you to make use of batteries normally considered dead. The open circuit output voltage of the joule thief in this circuit was about 31v peak. Highly recommended as an introduction to soldering and electronic principles. Question 2 is the 1n4148 diode neccessary in the above schematic. It takes about 14vdc to forward bias and light the four leds. Joule thief circuit powering a compact fluorescent lightbulb. The most basic schematic for a joule thief circuit this and the next pic are from how to get what you want. I wanted to create a joule thief, which can be used to supply some small electronic devices, but. A joule thief is a circuit that allows you to use the energy the joules still left inside a battery that is dead. This circuit boosts the peltzier output up to 14 volts by.
Its a little wisp of a circuit that allows you to drive a blue or white led from a low voltage. But whats really happening is that the battery voltage is no longer high enough for the. The circuit diagram for a joule thief is shown on the right. Joulethief circuit performance for electricity energy saving of emergency lamps view the table of contents for this issue, or go to the journal homepage for more 2017 iop conf. Turns out, you still cant get something for nothing. Contribute to diysciborgjoule thieftorch development by creating an account on github. Without load the led i have measured voltages over 30 v. Joule thief operation and the supercharged version. Yx8018 led driver in bunnings lytworx solar garden led lights mcauseryx8018 solarleddriver. The pcb layout in the tif file below has the windings clearly marked, and. Experiment with joule thief circuit do it easy with.
I also used some performix plasti dip comes in a one gallon can. Most joule thief circuit schematic specify the use of 1 or 2 coil. Normally the joule thief produces output voltage, which value is difficult to predict. One example you can reference is a video on you tube called jeannes light, or this other one by lasersaber called joule ringer and joule ringer 2. This circuit is also known by other names such as blocking oscillator, joule ringer. But the real reason is that we wanted to design a joule thief circuit that had some. Its a little wisp of a circuit that allows you to drive a. The normal joule thief circuit has only two coils, but as you can see in the above circuit diagram, this one has three. Friends in this video i will show you joule thief circuit. When power is first applied, current flows from the battery through the 1k resistor and one winding of the transformer into the base. Question 1 instead of using a transformer or winding a toroid coil. A joule thief is a play on words because it allows you to steal watts from dead or inefficient batteries for many, many seconds, if not weeks.
42 323 665 293 199 142 865 1297 520 6 805 965 1057 909 463 370 1257 1265 984 204 122 651 6 1145 540 912 319 140 1428 685 817 731 1026 144 591 817 380