SSG Handbook build question

[Tim]

Hello group, my first post here.

The question that I have is this, I purchased the beginners handbook and have what I believe is a correct build.

The energizer runs and charges very well, but when I did a 1 ohm test (was not in the handbook), my large 1 ohm (ceramic) resistor
did get warm to the touch. My question is this, because of the multi transistor build should this cause the 1 ohm resistor to get warm.

It was a slow process for it to get warm, but after several minutes it did get a little uncomfortable to hold in my hand.

The machine appears to charge very nicely with the identical garden tractor battery that I have.

The other question I have is this, at what discharge amperage should I use with my west mountain battery tester should I use for this size battery (there is no amp rateing on the bartteries)

I apologize if these are redundant questions, but it's been a long day at work here and I tired and may have overlooked it in the other posts that I glanced through.

Thanks in advance.

Tim

[Faraday88]

can you post a photo of the battery...may be i can guess its AH rating and then recommand you a C20 discharge rate for that.
rgds,
Faraday88.

[Tom C]

Hello group, my first post here.

The question that I have is this, I purchased the beginners handbook and have what I believe is a correct build.

The energizer runs and charges very well, but when I did a 1 ohm test (was not in the handbook), my large 1 ohm (ceramic) resistor
did get warm to the touch. My question is this, because of the multi transistor build should this cause the 1 ohm resistor to get warm.

It was a slow process for it to get warm, but after several minutes it did get a little uncomfortable to hold in my hand.

The machine appears to charge very nicely with the identical garden tractor battery that I have.

The other question I have is this, at what discharge amperage should I use with my west mountain battery tester should I use for this size battery (there is no amp rateing on the bartteries)

I apologize if these are redundant questions, but it's been a long day at work here and I tired and may have overlooked it in the other posts that I glanced through.

Thanks in advance.

Tim

one ohm test is only for a single bifilar machine.

Tom C

[James Milner]

Tim,
My 5 filar superpole did exactly the same thing. The test is not as valid as when using a bifilar as you are drawing (n-1)x more current than the original test. If it is taking some time to get warm it suggests the current is still fairly low which is what you want.
Mine current 9 filar draws 800mA-1A depending on how I tune it. so 100mA to 125mA per transistor. I have seen others up to 200ma per transistor.
Hope that helps
James

[Tim]

Tom C. or others,

Onto a couple of side notes, My energizer is drawing 1.3 amps from the supply battery. I know john said that his draws 1 amp so I'm assuming that this should not be a problem, but plaese let me know if you think differently.

Also my batteries are I believe 225 CCA, I did find that out after closer inspection. Can you give me an idea as to what amperage it should be discharged at for the correct c-20 rate?

I will post some pictures and possably a video, because I would like for someone to see the neon discharge sequence, they do not all flash brightly at the same exact time, but all do glow with a dull yellow on each element, they all do flash, just not at the same exact time and it is a BRILLIANT flash. I know this is not good for the transistors, so I do not let it happen for any more than a very short period.

Thanks again.

Tim

[Tom C]

Tom C. or others,

Onto a couple of side notes, My energizer is drawing 1.3 amps from the supply battery. I know john said that his draws 1 amp so I'm assuming that this should not be a problem, but plaese let me know if you think differently.

Also my batteries are I believe 225 CCA, I did find that out after closer inspection. Can you give me an idea as to what amperage it should be discharged at for the correct c-20 rate?

I will post some pictures and possably a video, because I would like for someone to see the neon discharge sequence, they do not all flash brightly at the same exact time, but all do glow with a dull yellow on each element, they all do flash, just not at the same exact time and it is a BRILLIANT flash. I know this is not good for the transistors, so I do not let it happen for any more than a very short period.

Thanks again.

Tim

dont worry about the neon flash, dont do it again. add some final base resistance to your trigger circuit, if you have a 12 ohm increase it to a 20 or 30 ohm resistor, that will bring it down.if you put a DC clamp meter on each strand it shows around 125 milliamps. so if you built the energiser to the books specs then that is what you will see. you can add a potentiometer to the circuit, dial it in and then replace with the proper resistor. the SG in the book is buitl with 100 CCa batteries in mind I believe.

Tom C

[Tim]

Thanks for the info, Tom.

[Tim]

Tim,
My 5 filar superpole did exactly the same thing. The test is not as valid as when using a bifilar as you are drawing (n-1)x more current than the original test. If it is taking some time to get warm it suggests the current is still fairly low which is what you want.
Mine current 9 filar draws 800mA-1A depending on how I tune it. so 100mA to 125mA per transistor. I have seen others up to 200ma per transistor.
Hope that helps
James

Thanks for the info James, I appreciate it.

[Aaron Murakami]

Tim, did you get all your questions answered including Ah rating for the battery?

[Tim]

Tim, did you get all your questions answered including Ah rating for the battery?

Aaron,

Not as of this time, I seem to remember that I seen a conversion formula to go from CCA to Ah on the web and I was going to look for that again.

The Batteries that I have are 225 CCA tractor batteries and any information that you or someone else may be able to give me as the Ah rating for these batteries would be much appreciated. I want to set my west mountain battery analyzer up for the correct C20 discharge rate.

The other question that I have pertains to the run battery size and is: If the run battery is a larger battery than the charge battery (same voltage, different Ah rate) would this skew the results of the tests to see what effect this type of charge has on the receiving battery? Should I see a performance increase (up to a certain point) reguardless of the supply to the energizer, and I'm looking at doing a cap dump for this machine, but I realize that's for the other thread.

Thanks,

Tim

[Gary Hammond]

Hi Tim,

The 225 CCA is very close to the 230 CCA Battery I have, which is a 13AH battery. The c20 rate would be 650 ma, or you could even use anywhere from 500 to 650 ma just as long as you consistantly use the same discharge rate all the time.

[James Milner]

Tim my tractor batteries are 240 cca and 35 aH on the label. Using that as a rough guide you would have a 32 to 33 aH battery.
So c20 would be 1.6 A.
Cheers
James

[James Milner]

Gary, seems like we have similar batteries but grossly different aH ratings which is surprising.
Looks like you might need to work it out by discharge or formula Tim. Better lower amp draw than higher above c20 and you could damage the battery longer term.
James

[Tom C]

Aaron,

Not as of this time, I seem to remember that I seen a conversion formula to go from CCA to Ah on the web and I was going to look for that again.

The Batteries that I have are 225 CCA tractor batteries and any information that you or someone else may be able to give me as the Ah rating for these batteries would be much appreciated. I want to set my west mountain battery analyzer up for the correct C20 discharge rate.

The other question that I have pertains to the run battery size and is: If the run battery is a larger battery than the charge battery (same voltage, different Ah rate) would this skew the results of the tests to see what effect this type of charge has on the receiving battery? Should I see a performance increase (up to a certain point) reguardless of the supply to the energizer, and I'm looking at doing a cap dump for this machine, but I realize that's for the other thread.

Thanks,

Tim

to begin with I like to use a similar battery on the front end and the back end. that way it is easy to see the gains in the circuit.

Tom C

[Tim]

Hi Tim,

The 225 CCA is very close to the 230 CCA Battery I have, which is a 13AH battery. The c20 rate would be 650 ma, or you could even use anywhere from 500 to 650 ma just as long as you consistantly use the same discharge rate all the time.

Gary and James,

Thanks for the replies and if the information that I found again is anywhere near correct it would appear that Gary is closer. What I found is a rough guess to figure the Ah rateing of a CCA battery is to divide the CCA by 20 and then take only 20% of that number to be the C20 discharge rate of my battery.

Therefore: 225 (CCA) / 20 = 11.2 (Ah) then 11.2 / 20 = .56 amps (560 milliamps) and then discharge the battery no lower than 12.2 volts as it is not a deep cycle battery, does this seem proper?

Thanks guys.

Tim