Headspace - a joule thief sculpture
In a couple of days, in the newly opened Icon Gallery in St James Square, Bath, some of my electronic wire sculptures will be on display. For those who don’t know about my experiments over the last ten months or so, I have been exploring a few ways to begin to work with radiant or cold electricity. The uses for this that I am playing with are lighting LEDs and charging batteries.
Why radiant electricity?
So what is radiant electricity and why use it for lights and batteries? Radiant power is always presented as spikes of high voltage but negligible current. This can’t do heavy ‘work’ directly but can light LEDs, which require little current. The sculptures include (and are) a simple radiant circuit called a joule thief , which allows the several 3 volt LED lights in the sculpture to be run from one single 1.5v battery, for many hours or days, even if the battery is ‘dead’ in a torch, camera etc. This little circuit allows the use of the rest of the power in the battery, even lighting an LED from as little as 1/3 of a volt in some cases!
You are very welcome to look into Icon Gallery and see not only my work but also the beautiful illuminated marble work of Haydn Sheppard, Jane Day’s elegant and earthy ceramics and more.
Loving your batteries
Using radiant methods to charge batteries is remarkable, in that the batteries not only charge, but the more they are charged this way the bigger and stronger they get. This is the opposite of what every other type of charging accomplishes. Cold electricity can be used to completely restore a battery that won’t take a charge in a conventional charger. On top of this, the charger itself uses less power than a conventional charger. I have built a couple of small radiant chargers and I can confirm that they improve a battery with use. There is an enormous amount of help and info out there if you wish to explore the DIY side of this technology.
Rennaissance Charge – truly green technology
If you want a ‘plug and play’ solution to radiant battery charging, I have now added a link on the site to Renaissance Charge LLC, a company formed around the amazing work of John C. Bedini. They sell the world’s only range of Radiant Energy chargers and cutting edge motor energiser kits. The chargers are as easy to use as any other battery charger but will restore, revive and improve any battery that they charge, unless it’s physically damaged in a way that precludes it working properly. The motor energiser kits are for your own experiments with this technology, but have excellent practical applications. The products cover all scales of application from charging a AAA battery to running a house off grid.
