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Battery Radiant charger
How many of you have read and tried to build circuits from PJK's book for example Alexkor?
I've tried several different versions but nothing worked well.
How do I test the output, I tried to put a 1uF cap and measure voltage across, is that correct way?
So the first question is how do I test the output and performance of these circuits without blowing anything.
I destroyed the ammeter fuse, an LED, and resistor.
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First I built a simple Joule thief, 2N2222, 1k resistor, 1.3v battery, 1n4148 diode and bifilar coil 1.2ohm and 140 uH (micro) AWG24. It gave me 25volts and resonates at about 108kHz. Ok that seems to work fine, I only blew an LED when I inserted another battery, actually I don't remember if it blew from 2 or 3 AA batteries. The way I understand it, it should charge batteries with cold electricity, but then it seems they don't respond well to that kind of charge and may develop a surface charge effect.
A possible solution is to use a capacitor and diodes to convert cold to hot, and then it becomes like a conventional charger, except it's supposed to give COP>1. My question is how to figure out the coil inductance and size needed, or how does it relate to speed of charging?
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Then I tried to build Alexkor the one with 555 timer and IRF510, regular coil, 200 turns AWG21, about 300uH, 1n5408 diode. When I tested it, I measured about 120v at the output, but for some reason 555 and the FET became very hot. It was built on a padboard so I thought there might be a short somewhere, I was going to build a new one on a bread-board, but since I have a small PWM generator I'll experiment with that instead of 555.
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Then I built the self-charging one with bifilar coil and MJE13009, one battery charges 4 other in series. Everything was exactly like in the book except the following, my bifilar coil is smaller, the same one I used in the Joule thief described above AWG24 wire. The one in the book should measure about 300uH and mine is only 140uH. Also I did not have 4 batteries at the output but single one.
When I tried to measure the output, with or without battery, I have tried with cap in series, without cap, different ways but something was always heating up. Then I realized the bias resistor was wrong, I put 1k instead of 2k. But even when I replaced it with the correct value, result was the same. Then I decided to go for the nest one, upgrading the transistor to 2SC3552, and of course UF5408.
I should mention that I had all of the parts before I started the whole thing, so it doesn't sound like I was doing it for months, and giving up the projects easily.
I will post a picture below, my circuit is the same except the coil is smaller and I don't have four batteries but one. Again the same thing, but this time the resistor is burning. It is 1k 1/4w. the capacitor is polyester film 2.7nF.
When shorted the circuit and measured current, it was almost 2A. I tried with a 470k for the bias resistor but it got hot too.
===============================
So I decided to ask for help, obviously I am doing something wrong but yet don't understand what.
I admit I'm a beginner electronics hobbyist, I've built a couple of devices that work well like guitar pedal and colloidal silver generator.
I try not to spend too much time calculating every single detail, I can't even tell if schematic is correct or not. I just follow the schematic and later troubleshoot the issues.
How do I test and find out if circuit is performing correctly?
I've tried several different versions but nothing worked well.
How do I test the output, I tried to put a 1uF cap and measure voltage across, is that correct way?
So the first question is how do I test the output and performance of these circuits without blowing anything.
I destroyed the ammeter fuse, an LED, and resistor.
===============================
First I built a simple Joule thief, 2N2222, 1k resistor, 1.3v battery, 1n4148 diode and bifilar coil 1.2ohm and 140 uH (micro) AWG24. It gave me 25volts and resonates at about 108kHz. Ok that seems to work fine, I only blew an LED when I inserted another battery, actually I don't remember if it blew from 2 or 3 AA batteries. The way I understand it, it should charge batteries with cold electricity, but then it seems they don't respond well to that kind of charge and may develop a surface charge effect.
A possible solution is to use a capacitor and diodes to convert cold to hot, and then it becomes like a conventional charger, except it's supposed to give COP>1. My question is how to figure out the coil inductance and size needed, or how does it relate to speed of charging?
===============================
Then I tried to build Alexkor the one with 555 timer and IRF510, regular coil, 200 turns AWG21, about 300uH, 1n5408 diode. When I tested it, I measured about 120v at the output, but for some reason 555 and the FET became very hot. It was built on a padboard so I thought there might be a short somewhere, I was going to build a new one on a bread-board, but since I have a small PWM generator I'll experiment with that instead of 555.
===============================
Then I built the self-charging one with bifilar coil and MJE13009, one battery charges 4 other in series. Everything was exactly like in the book except the following, my bifilar coil is smaller, the same one I used in the Joule thief described above AWG24 wire. The one in the book should measure about 300uH and mine is only 140uH. Also I did not have 4 batteries at the output but single one.
When I tried to measure the output, with or without battery, I have tried with cap in series, without cap, different ways but something was always heating up. Then I realized the bias resistor was wrong, I put 1k instead of 2k. But even when I replaced it with the correct value, result was the same. Then I decided to go for the nest one, upgrading the transistor to 2SC3552, and of course UF5408.
I should mention that I had all of the parts before I started the whole thing, so it doesn't sound like I was doing it for months, and giving up the projects easily.
I will post a picture below, my circuit is the same except the coil is smaller and I don't have four batteries but one. Again the same thing, but this time the resistor is burning. It is 1k 1/4w. the capacitor is polyester film 2.7nF.
When shorted the circuit and measured current, it was almost 2A. I tried with a 470k for the bias resistor but it got hot too.
===============================
So I decided to ask for help, obviously I am doing something wrong but yet don't understand what.
I admit I'm a beginner electronics hobbyist, I've built a couple of devices that work well like guitar pedal and colloidal silver generator.
I try not to spend too much time calculating every single detail, I can't even tell if schematic is correct or not. I just follow the schematic and later troubleshoot the issues.
How do I test and find out if circuit is performing correctly?
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