Earth Battery Joule Thief Experiments

[01Anastasia01]

Great work Pirate!!!!!

Am I understanding correctly that your Earth battery is just Carbon rods and magnesium buried in the ground?? At what depth?? Really interesting that you tried copper as both electodes, and still got power. I agree with your conclusions that galvanic action is therefore an unlikely cause of the power...but im no expert!!! Really want to try this earth battery thingy myself as i already have the typical joule thief in action. Thanks for all the inspiration mate.

[Pirate88179]

Thank you. Check out my latest video where I light 4 superbright leds to full brightness. These are 10mm, 28,000 MCD leds. Do a google on earth batteries. Read the wiki page as there are good explanations for a lot of questions. The alignment is critical and the depth is also a factor as the electrodes relate to each other. The depth is determined by the magnetic dip angle for your area, and they are aligned on the north/south meridian. (Not mag. north)

Bill

[Nabo00o]

Great video!

There is potential in this for sure, and what did you say, that the electrodes gave more voltage after being used?

Btw, can carbon rods be the common welding rods used in SMAW welding? Thanks!

[Pirate88179]

Thank you. I used carbon rods from a welding supply house that was local to me. These are called gouging rods. This is 1" in dia. by 18" long and I cut it into two 9" pieces. But now, with my large magnesium block, I may need more carbon on the + side.

My experience from a while back was, that once you put these into the ground, and either use them, or not, the potential goes up on both the mA's and the volts over time.  Nathan Stubblefield said the same thing back in the late 1800's. Bill

[Nabo00o]

Well, at least that's a good reason to believe that this isn't the common type of chemical reaction that we are used to.

Gotta search through our garage now.... Bye

[Pirate88179]

I have always been told that galvanic action will only yield 1.5 volts. In the very beginning of my research into this, I did a test (see overunitydotcom earth battery topic) using 2 pieces of copper pipe. 2 metals not dissimilar but the same. I placed them iin the n/s position and got volts and mA's. This told me it is NOT galvanic. I am no scientist but, there is something here.

Bill

[jonnydavro]

Hi Bill.Thanks for showing us this experiment.I wonder if you changed your joule thief into charge mode and charged up a supercap,you may be able to run your Bedini.Lidmotor has run on supercaps at low voltage so may be it's worth a try.Your experiment shows how easy it is to exploit something which is all around us and it certainly warrants further study.Regards jonnydavro

[Pirate88179]

Jonny:

Thank you. In my earlier earth battery experiments I used supercaps. This is where I first learned about them. You are correct in that I can charge a 3,000F cap and then probably run anything we want to run from it. I will be moving toward that in the near future. Thanks for your support and all of the things I have learned from your work.

Bill

[Drevtoobe]

Hey I will admit that I haven't read about Stubblefield. However, I am pretty sure what's going on is that the magnesium is corroding. That oxidation process generates electric current from the chemical reaction.

I have read a bit about telluric currents, and they produce something like a volt per kilometer, not a volt per meter. Any possible contribution from telluric currents is likely to be several orders of magnitude lower that the oxidizing magnesium.

[Drevtoobe]

After that downer, let me say something that's fun and cool! lol A common misconception made by people new to these experiments is to measure voltage only. What you really want to measure is power output. Without current the voltage means nothing.

You measure the voltage with your multimeter. Then with a variable resistor as a load, adjust it so the voltage drops by one half. Now measure the variable resistor setting.

Your max power output is V-squared/R. The output impedance is R.

[Drevtoobe]

Anyone who does energy pick-up from air or earth battery experiments should be discussing the power output obtainable. Measuring the open-circuit voltage or the short-circuit current is meaningless because in both cases no power is being output. The other important parameter is the output impedance (where you adjust the pot to) because that describes the "fluffiness" of the voltage source. If you try to make these measurements I would hope that you find the experimenting more insightful.

[Pirate88179]

Thanks but, since this is pulsed dc I am not sure that method works. A DMM will not measure pulsed power from my understanding. I will put my scope on it later on. I know last year I was getting about 200 mA's. Not much but my minus side was only a small mag. block. Plus, it is free!! Stubblefield got enough power to heat his home, run the Murry, KY phone system, light his farm and house. The power is there, tapping it the right way is the challenge. I don't claim to have any secrets.

[Drevtoobe]

Sorry I was not specific. All of the measurements I am talking about are the pure DC measurements without the Joule Thief. Don't forget the JT has nothing to do with your power output from the earth battery.

One day I will read up on Stubblefield. However, based on what you are saying he did, it would require an overwhelmingly massive earth battery and/or Telluric pick-up system. So it doesn't smell right.

[Pirate88179]

See? You don't get it. There is NO pure DC on the earth battery. It comes from the ground as pulsed DC. This is BEFORE I attach the joule thief circuit. Please read something about earth batteries before commenting further. You are going to confuse others. Thank you.

Bill

[Pirate88179]

Also, at a high enough frequency, voltage IS power, according to Tesla. Don't forget, I am converting pulsed dc to ac via the joule thief. It is running somewhere north of 50 mHz and this is a simple one. Our group is working on raising the frequency to much higher levels. A scope is the only way I know to measure any of this. I have worked with a research group on OUdotcom on the earth battery for almost 2 years. We really have researched quite a bit about these devices. Try one and see.

[Drevtoobe]

That quote of Tesla's is probably related to the propagation of EM waves, and that still requires some current to go with the voltage. Also, the JT typically runs at a few kilohertz.

Good luck with the OU group for the earth batteries, just remember you want to measure the power output. Once you know that you know how much energy you can produce per day, week, etc. It would probably take the typical earth battery more than a year to produce enough energy for a hot shower.

[Pirate88179]

I am no scientist here. all I can go by is what I read and see by my experiments. My last earth battery was working for well over a year. No deteriorating at all. My understanding is that galvanic action only give 1.5 volts, which is why all regular batteries, including car batteries, are 1.5 volts. (AAA,AA, C,D cells) The individual cells in a car battery are all 1.5 volts and they are in series to give 12 volts. did you read what the Russians have been able to do with Telluric currents?

[Drevtoobe]

No I did not read about the Russians, but I know that Telluric currents are nothing more than a response to the magnetic flux changes coming from solar wind in the ionosphere. The electric current density moving through the soil per square meter is minuscule, I will guess a few nanoamperes. The voltage depends on the specific chemical reaction, that's why there are 1.2 and 1.5 volta batteries, etc.

[Drevtoobe]

No deteriorating at all but how often was the battery driving a load? If the battery was not driving a load 99.9% of the time then the metal would not corrode. Also, if magnesium has properties like aluminum (not sure) then it might take a massive amount of electricity to produce that magnesium in the first place.

Anyway, I hope some of the stuff I said makes you ponder. If you really researched into Telluric currents chances are you will conclude that they are useless as a source of power.

[Pirate88179]

I have researched into this for over 2 years and my battery has been running almost that long with 3 leds. (the load) constantly. I dug up the electrodes and...no change at all. Heating your house is useless? Since when? This is all documented, all you have to do is read instead of making such leaps based upon no knowledge. I have built Stubblefield coils as well and they work too. This way is easier for where I live. My joule thief runs over 50mHz not kHz. If you made one, you'd know.

[Drevtoobe]

I respect your comments and will do some reading to inform myself and perhaps even ask a question or two. Have you scoped your JT because it doesn't seem right? The "SEC Exciter" runs at about 10 MHz in comparison.

[Daemo4]

Could this have something to do with the carbon rods being in proximity of a neighbors ground rod?

[Pirate88179]

No, do a google search on telluric currents and also check out Nathan Stubblefield. This effect has been known since the late 1800's. Telegraph batteries would short out and die and yet the telegraph lines still had power which was traced to telluric earth currents from the poles holding the wires. It is fascinating reading, I think you will enjoy it. Thanks.

Bill

[Pirate88179]

I just retested the output and it is now up to 2.0 vdc. I noticed the same thing on my other set-up about a year ago. The longer it was in the ground, the higher the volts went.

Bill

[jeannacav]

Wow

Oh yeay. awesome, Bill.

...

I will have to try this but with the little mg block and the carbon welders rod. Maybe only a red if not a 25,000mcd white. hmm - jeanna

[Pirate88179]

Thank you Jeanna. I have been waiting a long time to get back into this again, and now, armed with the joule thief circuit, it will be even better.

Bill