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Making a Simple Joule Thief (Made Easy)

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Making a Simple Joule Thief (Made Easy) http://www.instructables.com/id/Making-A-Simple-Joule-Thief-made-easy/?ALLSTEPS Making A Simple Joule Thief (made easy) 13Author: ASCAS(I don't have) I got interested in electronics and mechanics when i was 4 year old. And started soldering circuits (kits) at 7 years old. And improved soldering at 9 years old without any kit only followng circuit... more » Today I am showing you how to make a very simple joule thief. A joule thief has many applications, the best gadget that I made with was a "Water Powered Lamp", soon I'm going to post on a guide about it but first I need to post this guide. I used an iPhone 4S as my camera :))) What Is A Joule Thief ? To simplify everything, a "joule thief" is a circuit that helps drive an LED light even though your power supply is low. What can we do with it? We can use it to squeeze the life out of our old, almost drained, non functioning batteries. This project can also be considered as a green and environmental experiment, we can also use it as a flashlight that can be ran by an old, weak, almost drained battery. I even tried to use my water powered battery from my previous instructable the "Water Powered Calculator", the project was featured and displayed in instructable's front page in the "Technologies" category. My Next Projects That Involves A Joule Thief: (soon to be posted) - Water Powered Lamp - Water Powered Flash Light - Dead Battery Drainer Lamp Here's A Video From Make Magazine: Step 1 Parts And Materials The Parts Needed Are: (click the item to know where to find/ buy) - Round Ferrite Toroid (can be found in old CFL bulbs) - Old/ Used Batteries (can be found in garbage cans) - NPN Transistor (2N3904) - 1K Resistor (BRN-BLK-RED) - LED Light - Battery Tester (optional) - Soldering Lead - Copper Wire/ Magnet Wire - Battery Case/ Holder I want to share something. Here in the Philippines electronic parts are extremely cheap, they are extremely far cheaper from radio shack, for example one transistor costs (2 phil. pesos - 6 US cents), a LED cost (9 phil. peso - 29 US cents) and a 1K resistor cost (25 phil. cents - 0.8 US cents). I usually buy thing from Deeco or Alexan. Usually prices here are 15x cheaper from radio shack. Price conversion - $1 US Dollar = P0.31 Philippine Peso (12/24/11). Step 2 Schematic Diagrams Here are the schematic diagrams that are involved with the joule thief circuit. Step 3 Winding Wire At The Toroid First, connect both ends of the copper wire before wounding, be sure to remove the insulation. Then try to solder the ends so it would not split up. Second, wind the wire until you run out of space in the round ferrite toroid. I have some tips for you, try to use a gauge #22 enamel coated copper wire for better performance, oh! my last tip is that "the more you wind the wire to the ferrite toroid the better". Step 4 Soldering The Resistor Solder the resistor with one end of the wounded ferrite toroid's wire. Oh! also don't forget to level the other end of the resistor with the other unused wire from the wounded ferrite toroid. Step 5 Soldering The Transistor Solder the proper connections to the transistor. For the emitter - connect another wire, the wire will be connected to the negative part of the battery. For the base - solder the other end of the resistor to the base. For the Collector Solder the unused wire of the ferrite toroid. Step 6 Soldering The LED Solder the shorter wire of the LED to the tansistor's emitter and the longer part of the LED to the transistor's collector. After all that, you can now trim the excess wires. Step 7 Time To Look For Old Batteries Use your battery tester to confirm that your battery is close to death. The tester is only an optional tool, it's just used to determine the battery's remaining power. Step 8 Time To Test It - You're Done !! Dec 24, 2011. 2:29 PM ASCAS (author) says: thanks for the comment and reply :)))) Hope you luck :D 1 Jan 1, 2012. 4:39 PMproject_builder says: great project! Always wondering what to do with the old batteries i had laying around. im glad im not the only 13 year old doing projects like this. Try my 12 volt varyable power supply project! Thanks! 1 Jan 2, 2012. 7:12 AMricharno says: You got my vote! Thanks for this nice instructable. 2 Jan 2, 2012. 12:49 PMgrimdaddy says: I am not a electronics guy and I have a few questions. 1:What happens if you hook this up to a new battery? 2: What happens if you hook it up to a three volt cell? 3:Could this be adapted to a 1watt Led that runs on six volts? 4: Could this be adapted to a flashlight, more specifically a tactical flashlight? This looks like an idea that could go places. 13 Jan 2, 2012. 4:45 PM ASCAS (author) says: 1. It will have a longer battery life 2. The LED would wear out/burn 3. this circuit is not designed for that/ there are other circuits for that. 4. Yes. I made a flashlight out of it. Good luck :)))) Jan 3, 2012. 5:12 AMAce Frahm says: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joule_thief Reply Jan 3, 2012. 4:51 AMLo-couk says: Is there a practical use for a joule thief? Lighting LED's with a flat AA battery isn't the best use, so I'm wondering if it can be scaled up to start a car with a flat battery etc.. Reply Jan 2, 2012. 11:19 PMDick Cappels says: If I may, I would like to suggest a site that discusses alternative construction and components, and has tips on how to get your joule thief running, http://cappels.org/dproj/ledpage/leddrv.htm Reply Dec 25, 2011. 10:59 AMacmefixer says: The better choice for a Joule Thief is the 2N4401 or PN2222A, the 2N3904 is a poor choice. I think I've said that dozens if not hundreds of times, and it seems to me the more I say it, the more people use this weakling transistor. It seems like what I say has the opposite result. Maybe I should start using reverse psychology. Maybe if I start telling everyone they should use the 2N3904 because it's the best, they'll do the opposite and quit using it. Then when they find out how much better the other transistors are, they'll realize how weak the 2N3904 is. But for some reason I keep on being an optimist and tell people the truth, and, well, you know the story. Reply 2 Dec 25, 2011. 4:16 PMhanelyp says: I've had good luck using the 2N3904, or 2N3906 with polarity reversed. But I also parallel the resistor with a small capacitor (a couple pF is good) which helps the transistor turn off a lot faster, which helps performance whatever transistor you use. Also, if you use a 2N3904 with a full alkaline cell, a 2k resistor is appropriate to avoid exceeding transistor specs. Reply Dec 25, 2011. 9:40 PMacmefixer says: I'm shocked. You're the first to use the words transistor specs, not to mention avoid exceeding. All of the people who experiment with (more like abuse) transistors, as far as I can tell, don't even know what a datasheet is. Their projects have to be fed a constant diet of replacement transistors. Thanks for restoring my faith in humanity. Back to JTs. I found this document, and I find it interesting that the author finds that adding the Schottky diode increases the Figure of merit. I'll have to do some experimenting to find out why this occurs. Reply Jan 2, 2012. 2:19 PMcvbritton says: If I understand the Schottky diode correctly, it has a very low turn-on voltage (in the forward direction) which will let the positive pulse start sending current into the capacitor where it accumulates until the LED turn-on voltage is reached. When the pulse goes negative there will still be some usable charge in the capacitor that would otherwise be dumped to ground. Sound reasonable? Anybody got a spice model to run? Reply Jan 2, 2012. 11:13 AMaschmidt7 says: The thing I like about this is the blue light indicating the jewel thief action is kinda hard to see. If it was RED the whole world would see whats going on with your toy Reply Jan 2, 2012. 11:08 AMsgoldberg says: Very nice work and excellent pictures and explanations. keep it up! Reply Dec 30, 2011. 8:28 AMactivenowhere says: Can you link to a place selling suitable toroid? Taking apart a CFL really isn't the best option for me. Reply Jan 2, 2012. 10:44 AMCanoeman says: Any ham radio store or electronics shop should carry a wide spectrum of toroidial cores. Reply Jan 2, 2012. 7:51 AMzappymax says: eventually when you discard old lamps or circuitry, keep some of the toroids... Reply 13 Jan 1, 2012. 7:12 PM ASCAS (author) says: radioshack Reply Dec 27, 2011. 7:46 AMbuild-mat says: It very much impresses. But there are questions. Esteem also here these articles:http://www.build-mat.ru Too it is a lot of interesting. Reply 13 Dec 27, 2011. 2:52 PM ASCAS (author) says: Sorry.
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