Push-on flashlight. Eternal lantern with dynamo: features and benefits. What is a dynamo flashlight

A group of enthusiastic engineers have created a unique flashlight that can be charged from the human body. This makes it a virtually endless light source, small but sometimes very necessary. A flashlight is one thing that rightfully belongs to the "Must-Have" category.

Everyone should always have a pocket flashlight - you never know when it will come in handy. You need to have it at home in case of a blackout, in the car, on a country trip. However, everyone who at least once in their life had a personal flashlight, large or small, powerful or not very much faced with such a problem as dead batteries. It is very unpleasant, especially at a crucial moment to find out that the flashlight does not shine or shines in such a way that, at best, you can highlight its location in a dark space.

A group of enthusiastic inventors have managed to solve this problem. Why use batteries when you can use a thermoelectric generator in flashlights? For a powerful "spotlight" this technology is certainly not applicable, but for small pocket flashlights it is just perfect. It was on the basis of TEG that flashlight Lumen.

The principle of the Lumen, as well as its design, is incredibly simple. The idea is based on the already mentioned thermoelectric generator. The flashlight uses multiple LEDs to project light. The power of the glow is quite enough to read a book in pitch darkness! The flashlight itself is incredibly small, literally "finger-like".

The body of the device is made of aluminum. The device weighs only 45 grams. The TEG of the flashlight is started, provided that there is a source of thermal energy (heat) from 28 degrees Celsius. The ideal option in this case is the human body. There is a special finger groove on the body of the flashlight, by pressing on which Lumen turns on and starts working. The flashlight can work almost without interruption. It also has a built-in small battery and capacitor.

In the warm season, the flashlight is slightly charged even from the air around it, provided that its temperature is not lower than the set bar. Now the device is in the stage of a crowdfunding campaign. To implement the project, the creators needed only 5 thousand dollars. For 2 days of fundraising, the company beat off the established limit by 328%! Will enter the Lumen market in the first half of 2016. The cost of the device will be $ 15.

Will appeal to lovers of gadgets and - an irreplaceable travel companion.

There are many amateur experiments with electric current. It can be obtained even from the temperature of the human body, as well as by the induction method or the Faraday method. The first is brief, and the flashlight without batteries is a little lower and long enough for everyone to use the method.

Battery finger

A certain community of foreign inventors managed to create a device, or a Lumen flashlight, relying on the capabilities of a thermoelectric generator (TEG). It does not form a powerful beam, but it shines no worse than pocket flashlights from Chinese consumer goods at any bazaar.

For a powerful "spotlight" this technology, of course, is not applicable, but for small pocket flashlights the scheme is just perfect.

The principle of electricity generation by a mini-TEG in a Lumen flashlight is surprisingly simple. Generation supplies current to several LED "bulbs". The glow is enough to read or write text in the dark.

The flashlight weighing only 45 grams is called "finger". It "turns on" at a temperature (warm) less than thirty degrees. It can also be switched on at the appropriate air temperature.

The inventors installed a finger window on the device - attach it, and the light will appear. He can work endlessly without interruption. The flashlight was announced for sale for $ 15. Consider a photo of an everlasting flashlight that never went on sale

Such a message was given by many sites back in 2015, as well as the promise of enthusiasts to start releasing flashlights in a year. In total, they lacked 5 thousand dollars for the finishing technological breakthrough. But according to the crowdfunding announced by them (people's aid), they exceeded the amount by 328 percent in just a couple of days. Where is the thermo-flashlight? The Internet is silent.

Anyone can create an alternative light

Craftsmen will be able to assemble a flashlight without any other voltage modulator than a truly efficient TEG. By the name of the author, it is called "Faraday". What is its principle? We will tell you what you can make a perpetual lantern.

This is not to say that a Faraday flashlight does not need a battery. There is even a battery in the factory product. Let's just say: it is completely discharged and the light is off.

To light it, you need to shake the flashlight, then a neodymium magnet or a whole battery of them runs up and down through the induction coil. This suggests that making a flashlight from batteries and magnets is possible.

An alternating current with a voltage of 3 volts will appear in it. It passes the rectifier diode bridge, and its amplitude is equalized, converting the current into direct current. After all, only direct current can be used to charge any battery, including a flashlight. After recharging, its battery will turn on the light. But you can immediately "light up" only from the internal battery charged with the help of a magnet - "slider".

In the flashlight itself, there are the main elements, without which there will be no effect - an electric generator using the solenoid method and a rechargeable battery. The magnets at the top and bottom must necessarily receive shocks in the opposite direction from rubber plugs or metal springs. Then the charging of the battery and the brightness of the LEDs will be constant.

And here is a homemade product

So, any instruction on how to make an eternal flashlight will say that it can be placed in a cylindrical shape from a piece of PVC or plexiglass tube, as well as by placing any structure in a box with a protruding LED light bulb.

You need a couple of magnets from your computer's old hard drive, two rectifier diodes, and a white LED. The function of energy accumulators will be performed by capacitors.

Let's recall the features of coil winding. Most induction windings, when the wire is laid thread to thread and layer by layer. This method can be performed manually, or from a wrench like a well, but the wire must be factory wound. Then it is easier to transfer it to a new bed.

But we have an amateur design, so the winding is called overlapping. Our solenoid consists of a coil with two windings. As you noticed from the diagram on the website, the coil consists of two windings, the total length is 40 mm. Divide it into two halves. On both sides we wind 600 turns of copper wire 0.08 mm thick.

Note!

Install magnet repellents in the solenoid. Further installation will suggest a scheme for making an eternal flashlight, which you will find on the Internet.

Want a more powerful light source? To make it from a PVC pipe with a diameter of 20 millimeters, you will need:

• round neodymium magnets 15x3 mm;
• copper wire;
• low power reverse conduction triode;
• bridge of two or four diodes or rectifier 2W10;
• resistance;
• powerful capacitor or supercapacitor 1F 5.5V;
• power button;
• five-volt LED;
• hot melt glue;

The efficiency of the device depends on the quality of the coil winding. We wind a wire with a diameter with an end left not up to ten centimeters on the tube strictly according to the markings - about 500 turns. The first few of them are fixed with glue. The initial row of the spool should be tightly packed one to one. Further - as consistently as possible.

Solder the contacts to the places indicated on the diagram, insert neodymium. Shake the cylinder, and soon the LED will shine: the eternal flashlight is made by hand.

Photo of the eternal flashlight

Note!

Note!

Winter is gradually coming. In some countries and cities, the first snow has already fallen. However, the main thing for us is that the days are shorter and the nights are longer. This means that you can stock up on flashlights to somehow fight the darkness on the streets. We present to your attention another useful homemade product, which is most relevant in winter, due to the fact that many of us often go home from work when it is already dark.

We suggest spending a few minutes watching the video

What do we need:
- plastic spray can;
- syringe barrel;
- copper wire insulated with varnish;
- diode bridge;
- Light-emitting diode;
- shutdown button;
- Neodymium magnets;
- a capacitor with a capacity of 47,000 and a voltage of 16 V;

Let's start making a flashlight and start by winding copper wire around a syringe barrel. You need to reel as tight as possible, leaving no gaps. At the end, you should have two ends of copper wire.

We fix the resulting winding with adhesive tape. Note that the ends of the copper wire can be lengthened slightly to allow the structure to generate more power.

We proceed to the next stage of the assembly. Cut out the base of the plastic spray can.

The next step is to solder the diode bridge to the capacitor. We solder the wire coming from the minus of the bridge to the wire coming from the minus of the capacitor, and the plus wire to the plus one.

After that, you need to solder the copper wires to the two remaining wires of the diode bridge.

Finally, the positive and negative contacts on the capacitor must be passed through the switch to the LED.

Separately, we note that the LED receives energy from a capacitor, which is charged from the syringe barrel. One question remains to be answered: where exactly does this energy come from? The secret is to use neodymium magnets, which you need to put in a syringe and seal the cylinder holes.

After assembling the entire structure and placing it in a spray can, the flashlight will be ready for use. It works according to the following principle. To charge the capacitor and turn on the LED, you need to shake the flashlight well. The energy is enough for a couple of minutes, which is quite enough to walk through a dark alley on a winter night, after all, after all, not all streets are dark and scary these days, like in horror films.

In our world, quite a few people are engaged in homemade experiments in home laboratories and workshops. For some it is a way to assert themselves, for others it is a striving to develop their abilities. And so what if it is an experiment from hastily glued together parts. The main thing is that the device or circuit works. Today we will analyze just such an invention, made practically on our knees. However, it is based on the unshakable principles and laws of physics, which cannot be denied.
It's about a flashlight that works without batteries. Perhaps someone has already seen on the Internet the simplest Faraday generator, which allows a small LED to light up from a few movements of the conductor in the winding. Assemblies from a practically dead battery, an autotransformer and a transistor, which are capable of supplying a 3V LED at an initial voltage of tenths of a volt, are also not uncommon.
Here, the author went a little further, modernizing the device circuit, adding a rectifier, supercapacitor (supercapacitor), resistance and completely eliminating the power source. As a result, the operation of the flashlight has become much more stable and efficient. And if the case is shaken for a few minutes, it can be recharged for a long time of LED operation. How it works? Let's figure it out.

Principle of operation

The device consists of several inductors that you can assemble yourself. The primary inductor actually serves as a power source or completely replaces its usual counterpart - a battery. Due to the movement of a rod of permanent magnets in it, an electric current is induced. Oscillatory movements in a magnetic field create electrical waves that emanate from the coil at a specific frequency. A rectifier or diode bridge helps to stabilize them and convert them to direct current.
Without a storage capacity, such a device would have to be constantly shaken, so the next element in the circuit is a supercapacitor that can be recharged like a battery. Next, a step-up transformer or voltage converter is connected, which consists of a toroidal ferrite coil and two windings - base and collector. The number of turns can be the same and is usually 20-50. The transformer has a midpoint connection at the opposite ends of both windings, and three outputs to the transistor. The autotransformer increases the scanty current pulses into sufficient for the operation of the LED, and a bipolar transistor is connected to control them. A similar electrical circuit in different sources has different names: joule thief, blocking generator, Faraday generator, etc.

The necessary resource base for homemade products

Materials:

• PVC pipe, diameter 20 mm;
• Copper wire, diameter - 0.5 mm;
• Low-power reverse conduction transistor;
• Round neodymium magnets, size 15x3 mm;
• Diode bridge or rectifier 2W10;
• Resistor;
• Supercapacitor or supercapacitor 1F 5.5V
• Button switch;
• LED white or blue at 5V;
• Transparent adhesive such as epoxy resin;
• Hot glue;
• Pieces of plywood, cotton wool;
• Insulated copper wiring.

Instruments:

• Soldering iron;
• Hot glue gun;
• Hacksaw for metal;
• File, sandpaper.

Flashlight making process

The body of the flashlight will be made of PVC pipes. Mark a segment with a length of 16 cm, and cut it off with a hacksaw for metal.

From the center of the segment, mark 1.5 cm in each direction. It turns out a zone for winding with a width of 3 cm.

Next, we take a copper wire with a cross-section of 0.5 mm, leave one end of it about 10-15 cm long, and wind the wire around the tube-body of the flashlight by hand marking. You will have to wind quite a lot, more than half a thousand turns. The first few of them can be fixed with glue. We press the initial row of the coil tightly against each other, and make it strictly consistent.

At the maximum points, the winding should be about half a centimeter thick. We clean both ends of the wire with sandpaper for a secure seal.

The moving magnetic core of the coil can be either one-piece or assembled in parts. Neodymium magnets are matched to the inner diameter of the PVC tube. Empirically, the required length of the magnetic rod is gained, through the vibrations of which an electric current will be generated.

On the scale of the oscilloscope, you can see the difference between the potentials obtained from the vibrations of one and ten magnets. The author received a voltage of 4.5V from the vibrations of the magnetic rod. It also clearly shows the cyclicity of the sinusoid in the intervals of varying frequency.

At this stage, following the example of the author, you can connect the LED directly to the output ends of the coil, and check its performance. As you can see in the photo, the LED reacts to the movement of the magnetic rod, and the pulse current generated by it itself.

Now you need to plug both ends of the tube so as not to hold them with your hands while shaking. To do this, with the same hacksaw, we cut out several spots from plywood, process the edges with a file, lay them with a cotton swab from the back to soften them and put them on glue so that they do not fall out.

It was the turn to connect the rectifier. The diagram shown in the photo shows which two of its four contacts are connected to the coil. Such a diode bridge is capable of accepting alternating current, and delivering constant current strictly in one direction.

The step-up autotransformer will help convert the low spontaneous pulses from the primary coil into sufficient voltage for the LED to operate due to the self-induction of one of the collector windings. Since it is connected to the base winding, a constant and stable electric current will be supplied to the supercapacitor in sufficient quantity. The resistor will limit the excess of the permissible ratings. A capacitor of sufficient capacity was also selected by the author empirically by measuring the outgoing signals with an oscilloscope.

This circuit is closed by a reverse conduction bipolar transistor, which controls the incoming electric current to the LED. You can assemble the circuit without a board, since there are not so many parts. We mount the switch button on one of the contacts coming from the autotransformer.

The author preferred to assemble his improvised design of the flashlight with hot glue, while improving the insulation of the contact groups. The switch button is located on the side of the flashlight housing. The author glued the main elements of the circuit one on top of the other from one of the ends. The closing element is the LED, which can be enhanced with protective glass or a reflector.

Despite the unsightly appearance of the device, suitable only for laboratory and experimental homemade products, such a flashlight is quite efficient and, on occasion, will not let the darkness disappear. It is not difficult to assemble such a scheme at home and at minimal cost. And the complete absence of batteries makes it a really useful device for various emergency situations.

The title of the article will seem strange to many, but soon you will understand what the secret is. Say: everyone needs a battery. You are partly right, the current source is really needed, but who said that the battery should be the current source? In general, I'll tell you about everything in order. The body of the future flashlight is a suitable pipe - only plastic. We also need piezoelectric emitters from imported speakers, such piezo heads are very easy to find. It is in the piezo heads that half of the mystery is hidden! Some do not even imagine what kind of miracle it is and do not know about their hidden virtues.

Let's start with a little experiment. We take a piezo emitter, solder two wires to it, and to the wires. It should be noted that the plus of the piezo head is the center, and the minus is the rest. Observing the polarity, we connect the LED to the wires, put the piezo head on the table and hit it several times with a pencil or any plastic object. Voila! During impacts, the LED flashes! It is this phenomenon that we will use to charge our power source.

And now the most important thing is the power source itself. Everyone is perfectly familiar with voltage capacitors and our source is a capacitor, but a capacitor with a capacity of 1 FARAD! Yes, you heard right, exactly 1 farad. I took out such a capacitor from the car radio panel, but you can buy it on radio markets or in radio parts stores, or, in extreme cases, break the car radio and get it out of the part where the common board with the amplifier is.

You will definitely not confuse this detail with anything: black, two legs and an inscription of 5.5 volts, but this is a capacitor with a capacity of 0.3 farads. See below for photos of condensers. The round one has a capacity of 1 farad, and the rectangular one - 0.3 farad. You can get two containers of 0.3 farad each and connect in parallel or 3 pieces each. A capacity of 1 farad is enough for a 5-minute LED glow. Of course, by reducing the current, this time can be significantly increased.

We insert the piezo heads into the pipe as shown in the picture, but before that we take a plastic ball and also insert it into the pipe so that it is in the space between the heads. Then we glue the heads to the pipe with glue for a moment and wait until the glue dries. When it is high, we take the silicone and re-fix the heads, thus transferring the strength of the entire flashlight structure. The LED is ordinary white, you should not put powerful super-bright ones - it will hold less charge. After one minute of shaking, the capacitor will be fully charged.

Any power switch will work. Charging the capacitor is very simple - moving the flashlight up and down. Thus, the ball strikes the piezoceramic heads and the latter, in turn, generate current. Any low-power diodes. Agree, the design is as easy as shelling pears and practically does not require any monetary costs. Author - AKA.

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