Imhotep's Lab Interactive FAQ

I see no spikes, zip, zero. I'm a clueless experimenter.
I am not seeing voltage higher than a battery in the circuit.
Yes the circuit does charge the battery...
A Lower voltage source battery will charge higher voltage target (charge) battery.

I am not finding the spikes, metering spikes .. why?
They exist, else the higher voltage charge battery would not charge
from a lower voltage battery.

I wired my circuit as like this:
http://i369.photobucket.com/albums/oo13 ... erRO-1.jpg
This is a video of the circuit as wired:
http://s369.photobucket.com/albums/oo13 ... IRO_01.flv

Diode: pk in 5408 0731

My analog meter isn't calibrated ...

Source battery: Analog: 11.5 volts Digital: 12.25 volts
Charge battery:Analog: hair over 11 volts Digital: 12.41 volts
(I know those readings look squirrelly .. that's what I got, whatever)


Circuit running without charge battery, metering DC directly of the circuit
(this positive half of the neon is lit, therefore DC voltage, no surprise there)
Analog: hair under 6 volts Digital: bounces wildly, but stays below 6 volts
(is this strange? why 6 volts?)

Circuit running with charge battery, metering DC directly of the circuit
(neon is not lit)
Analog: 11.5 volts Digital: bounces (not wildly) between 1.?? volt and 12.?? volts but not over.

Metering off the charge battery is mostly smooth readings
and the battery shows it is being charged, slowly increasing.

What's my problem? How do I meter these spikes?

Thank you
Randy

Our meters cannot respond fast enough to read the spikes, not even digital ones. only oscilloscopes can respond fast enough.

The spikes are not normal electricity, there are no amps. analog meters need some amps to be able to give a reading

when your neon lights you have above 60v so you must be getting them.

we can measure the effects of these spikes so that's what we do, we measure rising voltage in the battery.

all meters give strange readings, even digital ones, when connected to this type of supply. my analog meter reads about 0 to 6v, my digital meter reads over 2000v at times. My scope shows 130 to 140v spikes. when i charge a cap the voltage rises to around 140v, that's the best we can do to measure the spikes.

The only thing we can do is measure the effects on charging a battery.

Well, I have a fairly cheap digital DC (Sunpro) automotive meter, has Volts, Ohms, Diode check,
and tach/dwell meter for setting timing, but that''s it. $20 Auto Zone special. It actually pegs out on
the 200V scale, when I try and read the spikes. My $70 RadioShack will not read spikes, it has some
sort of "buffering" in there, and likely is a more RMS style reading, my IRO's read anywhere from 40V
to 70V with no load and drop to battery "state of charge" with a load (charging battery.) Pretty much
what I would expect from a better meter. I was just surprised that the cheap-o meter reads a spike.
Very repeatable. It sometimes cycles around 120V then pegs, and back again, if the IRO needs cleaned
on the contacts... My IRO's will go over 300V on a big 450V cap, but it is very old. likely 40 - 50 years
old, it was in Dad's basement as long as I can remember... till I asked him if I could have some goodies

Hey thanks you 2, Rob and mbrownn for your answers.

What cap should I purchase to prove to myself and others that
the "real-deal" is high voltage is coming out .. a point-your-finger at and make the statement: "See there..!!"

A benchmark of some kind would be nice, via using a cap, when comparing circuits and relays.

I did notice that the "whatever it's called" is not making contact with
the unused terminal (contact) 87 while running.
I've heard others speak about using the, originally unused contact, for gathering more spikes, but my relay, the "whatever", does not make contact. The whatever does not swing that far.

I've found only 12 volts works with this relay, well my relay.
I've tried 6 volts and 18 volts.

While I have your attention.
Cap question. I've seen (in videos) the removal of the charging
voltage causing the metered voltage of a cap drop rather quickly.
Is that due to the cap losing the charge (bleeding down?), due to being metered is draining the cap or both. What specification of a cap indicates it holds a charge and does not bleed down?

If it bleeds , where is the blood (life force) going?

Randy (see why I did not become a Moderator )

I have some 450V caps, rather old but I can get 310 volts or so built up.

IMO the meter bleeds it off somewhat, because I get a higher reading at first then it goes down
immediately. That is near the 300 volt range. (280 and up). So I disconnect then let it charge and set
the meter to min/max mode, and it holds the highest reading. Plus, the inner plates/electrolyte must
be breaking down somewhat, they might be 50 years old and they are multi-caps (4 different caps in
one housing) and not all the "cells" hold charge.

If you buy an HV cap for reading spikes, get one at least higher than your spikes should be (450 is perfect)
and a smaller microfard rating will charge faster. Bigger caps take longer to hit the actual spike voltage.
That's because in caps, current leads voltage. Coils are opposite. Voltage shows immediately while the
current has to build up against the inductive reactance of the coil.

ELI the ICE man. Get to know him

That's the mnemonic to remember how capacitance and inductance effect voltage and current in a circuit.


The "whatever it's called" is the common contact, spring loaded "arm" that the coil moves to perform
the switching function. I do not know a succint term for this, but I call it the switch arm. It will
do nothing if it contacts the 87 contact, unless you hook something to that contact and then it must
touch. It would funnel out part of the radiant charge, but that is not needed. It all goes out through
the diode. Touching the 87 contact would just slow it down and/or require much higher voltage to the
coil and still slow down the spike production. Minimal travel of the switch arm is crucial for fast spikes.