SSG Where the rubber hits the road

[guyzzemf]

Pat
i dont u to be a slave to SSG Marcia said to me a long time ago that if ,say your pulling 1.5 amps to get a full charge say in 12 hrs
when your discharge at 1,5 amps if the discharge goes past 12 hr its 1 to 1 or better .[of course to same ending voltage for both batts]
guy

so to do this batteries need to be the same

[Allen R.]

Hi Patrick. Thanks for all you have already shared. It's enough challenge to adjust the ssg properly plus you are producing and editing video to go with it. That is a whole other job itself to do right. Many thanks for choosing to spend Your time sharing with everyone.

Don't let the naysayers and disrupters that always come out when you show numbers that are beyond their "impossible to break" barrier irritate You. I know they will start in with their mess.

I wonder if something similar to what John B. did with the small comparator on the original bike wheel ssg machine would help you take a "snapshot" cop measurement. http://youtu.be/TRLVhKzamUE He makes a comment about us figuring out the numbers on its effieciency. Maybe something similar would work. Out of my league here just thinking.

Im up to my eyeballs in work but I always watch the vids and read. I wanna checkout Bobzilla's solid state stuff if I can get the time.

many thanks

al

[BobZilla]

Really good work Patrick, thanks for sharing!

I know what you mean about babysitting those 1hr cycles. I started to try that on my new setup and it went ok for awhile but then I goofed it up, hence we have not seen those types of runs from me yet.

Most people have no idea just how much effort it takes to do a controlled experiment like that.

I look for any input on anything I might not be considering in the data and/or method I've posted.

The only thing I could say playing devils advocate here is that the primary draw and the load draw are not exactly equal . What I am saying is the machine is running a pulse load but the bulbs run a constant load. Nothing to really do about that and it is not unique to your machine, we all have that issue. It could be significant though, all those little milliseconds between magnet passes would add up over the long view. With that said their is nothing really we can do about that and your work is fantastic.

[min2oly]

Aaron M did a nice job a while back showing how to use a scope across a resister to measure amps. I can’t fine the thread but it’s here somewhere. It’s definitely something to keep in mind and a good point to bring up. Sometimes I just take the work I’ve done in the past for granted. I used a scope to verify my meters a while back. The RadioShack meter I show in the vids happens to be very accurate some others are not.
TinselKoala does a nice job in this vid so I won’t bother duplicating:

Good stuff


Also, in JB’s vid w/ the SG small cap dump, that’s kind of the direction I’m headed. His suggestion of measuring joules by amp pulses gets more complicated than I’d like, however. I’ll get there, still plugging away.
KR,
Patrick A

[min2oly]

Hi All,
so I broke down and purchased the best garden battery off the shelf at fred meyer's. I took my impedance meter w/ me and inspected the batteries they had closely, opening them all. I'm getting very nice runs, better than w/ the toyota battery.

Something I never had happen w/ all my used battery's or my brand new SLAB's. This garden battery came at 12.50 volts. I put it on the wheel and it would not break 15V on the first charge. I left it on there for 2 days! I finally pulled it off and drained it to 12.2 w/ a bounce back to 12.35-ish. I repeated this and on the 4th charge cycle it reached 16.5V.
Cool stuff!
spinning away...
Patrick A.

[jelloir]

Hi Patrick, I'm COP testing amongst other things at the moment as well, I'm wondering if the new batteries I bought are up to snuff as I have hit a wall with my COP testing... Should a good battery reach 16.5V? Mine reaches the "knee" at about 15.3v but to get to 16V would take time, I have pushed it to about 15.8V but that was by using no base resistance and pummeling the battery.

Coincidentally I decided to pull it right down to 11.9V (had been taking it to 12.2V previously) and charge it up again. It's currently at 15.3V so I'll just keep pushing it and see where it ends up this run.

James

[min2oly]

Hi James,
I don't know if that is the test for a "good" battery. I've never NOT been able to get a battery to 16.5V. This battery was the first. It gets there now though. I've heard of others taking batteries down to those levels as a method to "break them in" I don't think a battery needs to be taken to 16.5 although Peter mentions it should once in a while... I haven't read his book, Aaron M. mentioned it in a post somewhere.

regarding COP testing - I've given up taking the battery to a full charge. That has NEVER worked well for me. My best results are when I let the battery show me where it wants to produce OU results.

charge the bat to whatever max charge you can, then...
discharge 2 hours "x"amps - charge for 2 hours "x"amps - rest, take voltage.
repeat until the battery voltage stabilizes. if the battery never goes down then you have a winner - start playing around w/ taking more than you put in. if the battery drops to 12 volts, more work needs to be done.

hope this makes sense, writing on the run...
KR,
Patrick

Hi Patrick, I'm COP testing amongst other things at the moment as well, I'm wondering if the new batteries I bought are up to snuff as I have hit a wall with my COP testing... Should a good battery reach 16.5V? Mine reaches the "knee" at about 15.3v but to get to 16V would take time, I have pushed it to about 15.8V but that was by using no base resistance and pummeling the battery.

Coincidentally I decided to pull it right down to 11.9V (had been taking it to 12.2V previously) and charge it up again. It's currently at 15.3V so I'll just keep pushing it and see where it ends up this run.

James

[BobZilla]

Guys the voltage will be relative to the current pushed on it. Batteries with sulphation may not go high but once you have a clean battery it will raise up to 16.5 and higher IF you are pushing that hard on it.


Patrick I think with your new one what happened is it had a little sulphation but you quickly cleared it up and now it is a good clean battery. Decrease the power a bit and it will peak at 16v or 15.5v or wherever you want it to. I see a lot of people obsessing on voltage but it is relative to how you run your machine and the size of the battery,what really counts is the curve. The voltage is just a indirect look at the current being imposed it will rise and fall as you change the current. Take the fully charged battery and make adjustments and you will see this very easily.

A smaller battery takes less current to raise it up so if you were to tune to 16.5 on a good garden battery and then swap out for a larger battery it will peak lower because of the current distribution although both are fully charged. If you ran charts on both batteries the shape of the curve would be very similar but the smaller battery would level at 16.5 and the larger maybe 15.5 under the same tune.

Hopefully this makes sense but maybe not. using charts and different batteries has shown me exactly how that works.

[min2oly]

Hi Bob,
I think I am confused, it sounds like you're saying that it is the input/output current that should determine how a given battery charges, and depending on the current and the charge battery size/condition this will determine the charge curve?
I'll have to think on your words a bit more.

my thought is that it is ALL about the potential/voltage and the only time current comes into play is when I test the output of the charge battery. I'm always pushing as little current as possible.

I know what you are talking about with the charge curve, that's when you know your battery has reached it's full potential - ba-da-bum-psh... hehe This is not, however, where I have had my most efficient results. mine come at the 90% charge line this is the one I've been exploring most.

Guys the voltage will be relative to the current pushed on it. Batteries with sulphation may not go high but once you have a clean battery it will raise up to 16.5 and higher IF you are pushing that hard on it.


Patrick I think with your new one what happened is it had a little sulphation but you quickly cleared it up and now it is a good clean battery. Decrease the power a bit and it will peak at 16v or 15.5v or wherever you want it to. I see a lot of people obsessing on voltage but it is relative to how you run your machine and the size of the battery,what really counts is the curve. The voltage is just a indirect look at the current being imposed it will rise and fall as you change the current. Take the fully charged battery and make adjustments and you will see this very easily.

A smaller battery takes less current to raise it up so if you were to tune to 16.5 on a good garden battery and then swap out for a larger battery it will peak lower because of the current distribution although both are fully charged. If you ran charts on both batteries the shape of the curve would be very similar but the smaller battery would level at 16.5 and the larger maybe 15.5 under the same tune.

Hopefully this makes sense but maybe not. using charts and different batteries has shown me exactly how that works.

[jelloir]

This has been one of things troubling me about tuning my SSG.

Here is a quick run I just did to illustrate partially what I think Bob is getting at... Correct me if I'm wrong Bob.



I increase the current, it increases where the charge curve "sits" but the curves are basically parallel to each other. This is especially obvious when hitting point O and P in a usual charge since at 12Ohms I will hit point O at 13.7V but with no base resistance it hits point O at 14V for example. So using the COP testing method John K suggested to you earlier leaves me cold, since any gain from lower base resistance is met with higher current draw and visa versa . Coil gap is much the same.

I'm sure there is a tuned spot but identifying it is obviously tricky for me at least, although I don't do myself any favors by getting impatient and changing my wheel's magnets blah de blah all the time

I am going to try your method Patrick and see how it goes.

[min2oly]

I think maybe there are two different conversations going on here?

one is how or when does a battery take on a full charge. so by looking at a charge curve from say 12.2V to 15V, there is a point where the charge vs time curve changes dramatically, this is when the graph line begins to shoot up, and where I think battery is close to charged, Mr Bedini has some vids showing this curve I think Bob has a couple of charts as well.
IMHO a battery will take on this straight vanilla radiant charge better after it has been cycled cycled a few times to the higher voltages.

So the method I'm proposing here (which is really a spin off of John K's advice) is, after completing the above and you know you have a good battery, then do the 2 hour cycle's to "prove" to yourself OU. You can do this before, however, I've always had better results after the complete cycles.
disclaimer... this should not be relevant if you are using a cap dump.

This has been one of things troubling me about tuning my SSG.

Here is a quick run I just did to illustrate partially what I think Bob is getting at... Correct me if I'm wrong Bob.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]3548[/ATTACH]

I increase the current, it increases where the charge curve "sits" but the curves are basically parallel to each other. This is especially obvious when hitting point O and P in a usual charge since at 12Ohms I will hit point O at 13.7V but with no base resistance it hits point O at 14V for example. So using the COP testing method John K suggested to you earlier leaves me cold, since any gain from lower base resistance is met with higher current draw and visa versa . Coil gap is much the same.

I'm sure there is a tuned spot but identifying it is obviously tricky for me at least, although I don't do myself any favors by getting impatient and changing my wheel's magnets blah de blah all the time

I am going to try your method Patrick and see how it goes.

[BobZilla]

Hi guys,
Now there are at least two conversations heh,, let me try and clarify a few things about what I was saying.

First in response to Patrick

Hi Bob,
I think I am confused, it sounds like you're saying that it is the input/output current that should determine how a given battery charges, and depending on the current and the charge battery size/condition this will determine the charge curve?
I'll have to think on your words a bit more.

my thought is that it is ALL about the potential/voltage and the only time current comes into play is when I test the output of the charge battery. I'm always pushing as little current as possible.

I know what you are talking about with the charge curve, that's when you know your battery has reached it's full potential - ba-da-bum-psh... hehe This is not, however, where I have had my most efficient results. mine come at the 90% charge line this is the one I've been exploring most.

Not exactly what I meant Patrick. I think I will shoot a small video to explain what I meant but in short, the "current " I was speaking about is very little, we all know to use potential yada, yada,, but there is still current there. It can increase by poor switching or faster RPM, coil gap, etc.. but all of those spikes crunched together DO create a current, just not a large current like a conventional charger.

The point I was making is if you increase that by whichever means RPM, Input Amplitude, whatever your voltage on the output battery will rise. It does not take much either, a few ma measured can be the difference between 15v and 16.5v. Think of it this way, you know 16v is not the true voltage of those cells because when you stop charging it settles back to 13.2 or wherever right,, so while you are charging it is the little bit of current which is pressurizing and forcing the meter to show you 16v, this is a reflection of the pressure from the current.

A smaller battery as I said before will take less of this pressure to pump up to 16v, so at the same tuning on a small one may go there but a larger one reads 15v (provided both are good batteries in the first place). Your machine is tuned exactly the same for both, same spike voltage, the difference is the larger battery can take more "pressure" or current and does not rise to the same voltage. Imagine it as a fluid dynamic or a balloon, not a direct translation but it may help to understand what I mean.

I will say again that when I am talking about current in this context I am not talking about AMPs of current, I am well aware of potential charging and how a mode one charge works HOWEVER do not ignore that even those spikes DO have current and that is what I am talking about.


Now to James, yes I think you are understanding what I mean but look at it once you have a fully charged battery instead of on the climb. If you lower your input or RPM, I keep saying it that way because it is not tied directly to your input from primary, it can be but more directly it is your output so your switching speed could change the spike current too with same input, say two spike or 1 spike both can draw the same off the input if adjusted but a far different output,, Back to what I was saying on a fully charged battery you can easily see the effect I am speaking about by varyiing your output, you can make it sit at 16.5 or slow down and sit at 15v,,, the battery is no more charged either way and that was my point originally, people obsess on finishing voltages but it is relative to the current imposed and the size of the battery.

None of my comment were in relation to Patricks method of COP testing by the way.

Let me know if I am making any sense at this point. If not I can try a video, I know I have a hard time properly explaining these topics in an understandable way.

[min2oly]

Ok - maybe 4 conversations and I'm having 3 of them in my own mind

I get what you were trying to say now :-)
it's just the use of the word current throwing me off...
So I wonder if "current at faster than the speed of light" can still be called current. The discharge after the spike has plenty of current if the timing is right =2 or more than the input. The spike itself, however, I'll leave that to the experts. Your explanation sounds reasonable.

please don't spend any video time on explaining for my sake, I would much rather see how you did the bouncing cap discharge spike surf thingy. That's the one I would like to replicate.

KR,
Patrick A.

Hi guys,
Now there are at least two conversations heh,, let me try and clarify a few things about what I was saying.

First in response to Patrick



Not exactly what I meant Patrick. I think I will shoot a small video to explain what I meant but in short, the "current " I was speaking about is very little, we all know to use potential yada, yada,, but there is still current there. It can increase by poor switching or faster RPM, coil gap, etc.. but all of those spikes crunched together DO create a current, just not a large current like a conventional charger.

The point I was making is if you increase that by whichever means RPM, Input Amplitude, whatever your voltage on the output battery will rise. It does not take much either, a few ma measured can be the difference between 15v and 16.5v. Think of it this way, you know 16v is not the true voltage of those cells because when you stop charging it settles back to 13.2 or wherever right,, so while you are charging it is the little bit of current which is pressurizing and forcing the meter to show you 16v, this is a reflection of the pressure from the current.

A smaller battery as I said before will take less of this pressure to pump up to 16v, so at the same tuning on a small one may go there but a larger one reads 15v (provided both are good batteries in the first place). Your machine is tuned exactly the same for both, same spike voltage, the difference is the larger battery can take more "pressure" or current and does not rise to the same voltage. Imagine it as a fluid dynamic or a balloon, not a direct translation but it may help to understand what I mean.

I will say again that when I am talking about current in this context I am not talking about AMPs of current, I am well aware of potential charging and how a mode one charge works HOWEVER do not ignore that even those spikes DO have current and that is what I am talking about.


Now to James, yes I think you are understanding what I mean but look at it once you have a fully charged battery instead of on the climb. If you lower your input or RPM, I keep saying it that way because it is not tied directly to your input from primary, it can be but more directly it is your output so your switching speed could change the spike current too with same input, say two spike or 1 spike both can draw the same off the input if adjusted but a far different output,, Back to what I was saying on a fully charged battery you can easily see the effect I am speaking about by varyiing your output, you can make it sit at 16.5 or slow down and sit at 15v,,, the battery is no more charged either way and that was my point originally, people obsess on finishing voltages but it is relative to the current imposed and the size of the battery.

None of my comment were in relation to Patricks method of COP testing by the way.

Let me know if I am making any sense at this point. If not I can try a video, I know I have a hard time properly explaining these topics in an understandable way.

[BobZilla]

Well I'm glad it sort of makes sense, not that important really but since I said it I wanted to try and clarify.

Yea I'm not ready to start a thread about that cap dancing bit yet. I have been working with the new machine and I actually just built another which I might post soon. The new one has no BJT's,,, only FET's. I actually used that same board I am using on the trigger of the other machine but for the coils themselves.

I had posted a lot of info about the cap dancing in another thread when I was first figuring it out and then that video sort of wrapped it all up. I don't want to clutter your thread with it but PM me if you have any specific questions about what I was doing. I thought the video pretty much explained it didn't it?

[min2oly]

MONOKOTE ECONKOTE
that looks like it would work well w/ a heat gun, I Think I still need to cover the magnets. I still feel quite a bit of air being pushed around even w/ a slow 170rpm...

Bob and all,
Here is one way I like to get to two spikes:

Kind Regards,
Patrick A.

Hi Randy,
I'm assuming you're reading the new posts like most everyone. So I'm replying to your question bringing to light this old post. LMK if you have further questions down this path...
Kind Regards - Patrick A.