my home made inverter circuit

[Nickk2057]

hello to all the fandom of the electronic field and a BIG hello to the best person on youtube to Mr. Dave himself.. anyways.. my name is Nickk2057.. and i wanted to show off my home made inverter circuit.. and i hope that Mr. Dave can try it himself too....

anyways here is the link to it... and hope he can try it and put it on youtube as well since its alright by me for him to try

anyways... here is the link to it from my youtube

hope he has fun with the fun time there... it will be a shocker XD

[RPBCACUEAIIBH]

Are you driving those transistors with square or sine wave, or with some pwm solution???
I was thinking about making an inverter as well, with 2n3055 transistors(I have a few of it at home), and a huge transformer that still remain of my father's inverter which he made about 25 - 30(or more) years ago... He driven it with square wave, and he said that the washing machine and other equipment with AC motors didn't liked it, but it was good for lighting... (They didn't had much current at here in Romania at the time of communism especially at night so he made some... )

[madshaman]

Pretty cool Nick.  Do you have a scope yet?  If not, keep your eyes out for one, it helps to be able to probe things like the gate and drain on those mosfets for one.

Thanks for sharing!

[Nickk2057]

well really the inverter is still in working phase.. and i was using an analog scope (hooked up to the input on my computer through a resistor) and also was able to get close to 250 watts output.. which aint bad... the range of the Hz range was about 60 HZ range cause it was doing a double loop through the transformer meaning that there are double the poles in it... one centertap was at 5 volt range and the other was 24 - 0 - 24 centertap from a old home amplifire which aint bad for the first time with these transistors.. and i apologize that i said on that video.. it was NOT mosfets... it was PNP transistors on those.. but still worked great with that project.. but when the power starts draining on the batteries so does the voltage on the output.. and also the amps on the output as well... tho the output aint at a high output yet.. one time i went to try a 500W halogen light and was able to light it up.. which has surprised me quite a bit... but it put quite a straine on the batteries since i was using two of em... but really trying to get to use just one so i can try it in my car so i can have some mobile power to use drills and such

anyways.. hope it answered any of your questions.. i am going to try another methed to make a French inverter circuit which is using a combination of NPN transistors and NPN mosfets... hope i dont blow any up hehe.. anyways.. wish me luck

[Nickk2057]

Are you driving those transistors with square or sine wave, or with some pwm solution???
I was thinking about making an inverter as well, with 2n3055 transistors(I have a few of it at home), and a huge transformer that still remain of my father's inverter which he made about 25 - 30(or more) years ago... He driven it with square wave, and he said that the washing machine and other equipment with AC motors didn't liked it, but it was good for lighting... (They didn't had much current at here in Romania at the time of communism especially at night so he made some... )

and by the way... what transformer is it? cause i was using the one from a home amplifier... but the next on ei am making is a french inverter circuit.. which is using a combination of the NPN transistors and NPN mosfets... also the transformer i am using on that one next will be from an old UPS with a centertap 6-0-6 input... tho i know that on mosfets it will be lower on the output but with a high current.. tho the transformer will be at high watts if i use a proper heatsink on the transistors

[Nickk2057]

my FISRT inverter was a first kind i made which has a better version the using 2N3055 transistors.. which was rated for 15 amps.. the audio guy that was in town here told me to try a more powerful version which was rated at 20 amps.. which was much better to use and was more powerful on the output... and also the resistor i used was two 100ohm 10W ceramic resistors and four 2nh3773 transistors which went ok but did not have a high output to run a 100W light bulb.. kept draining out when i turn it on with load... but it went good on it.. tho it DID sound like on it that it will do stuff but nope.. it did not...

anyways here is the vid of it

[Nickk2057]

well... i got bad news.. the french inverter circuit turned out to be a bunch of crap... did not do what it says.. and worse... it did not even show a little ripple on the tests... not even a spark... but i DID do another method that worked fantastic.. i will show it in a sec... have to load it up on youtube

[c4757p]

The "French inverter circuit" that I saw you post before looked fine. Old-fashioned but fine. Check your connections.

[Nickk2057]

i did... and even with a light bulb too... even on the mosfets... but it did not do anything... and the parts i got from radioshack too... i did everything correctly.. soldered all the connections and stuff

[Nickk2057]

plus i tested it five times today.. with no reward in this crap... oh well

[madshaman]

Try to figure out why by probing circuit points, you could have made a mistake.  I recently had wacky behaviour in a circuit I built because I'd put a voltage regulator in backwards and didn't realise; DON'T LAUGH, I *know* you've all put a three pin device in backwards before ;p

[c4757p]

Couple questions (the schematic is on this thread for anyone else who wants to look).

1) The gates of the MOSFETs are supposed to connect to the collectors of the transistors. The muppet that drew this schematic left out the dots and it looks like they're supposed to cross without connecting. Did you connect them? That is absolutely critical.

2) What kind of transformer did you use?

3) Remove the MOSFETs (or the transformer) and run the circuit (it's harmless without the transformer attached, go ahead and mess around with it). Does it oscillate? If you have any way to measure the frequency, what it it? (Hint: It will oscillate at audio frequency. If you lack an oscilloscope or a multimeter with a frequency measurement, you can listen to it. It's your job to figure out how.) Edit: I see you have an oscilloscope. Sorry for not reading...

[madshaman]

This might also help if you didn't already know what it was: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multivibrator

P.S. do you have any opamps lying around?

[Nickk2057]

Couple questions (the schematic is on this thread for anyone else who wants to look).

1) The gates of the MOSFETs are supposed to connect to the collectors of the transistors. The muppet that drew this schematic left out the dots and it looks like they're supposed to cross without connecting. Did you connect them? That is absolutely critical.

and yes i did connect them

2) What kind of transformer did you use?

i used a UPS transformer that has a 6v - 0v - 6v centertap in it

3) Remove the MOSFETs (or the transformer) and run the circuit (it's harmless without the transformer attached, go ahead and mess around with it). Does it oscillate? If you have any way to measure the frequency, what it it? (Hint: It will oscillate at audio frequency. If you lack an oscilloscope or a multimeter with a frequency measurement, you can listen to it. It's your job to figure out how.) Edit: I see you have an oscilloscope. Sorry for not reading...

and yes i even hooked up a speaker to it to see if it has a tone on it.. and with nothin to it

[c4757p]

Without the MOSFETs and transformer, it's just a classic astable multivibrator. There's nothing wrong with it at all, it should have no problem oscillating. There must be something wrong either with the way you've connected it, or with the transistors.

[madshaman]

Quick questions:

1) (repeat of the edit from my last post) have any opamps lying around?
2) model of MOSFET you're using?

[Nickk2057]

ok... what i've done was disconnected the transformer off the circuit.. and took off the mosfets too... and hooked em up to the speaker to hear any humming from it... but nothin came out... hold on and i will show a picture of it

[c4757p]

Connect the speaker in series with one of the 680 Ohm resistors. Any other configuration will load the multivibrator and make it stop oscillating.

[madshaman]

Connect the speaker in series with one of the 680 Ohm resistors. Any other configuration will load the multivibrator and make it stop oscillating.

He's got a scope eh?  Less painful..

[c4757p]

I thought so, but I went back and looked, and realized I have absolutely no clue what this means.

and i was using an analog scope (hooked up to the input on my computer through a resistor)

So... do you have a scope, Nick?

[Nickk2057]

yes... its a software that uses the analog audio input of a computer to use it on... plus using a resistor too on it.. but stll nothin.. when i hook it up it does jump but still no vibrations on the screen

[c4757p]

You've swapped collector and base...

[Nickk2057]

nope.. i did not... hold on and i will show you another picture of what the guy did

[Nickk2057]

here is the picture of it

[c4757p]

Not all transistors have the same pinout. 2222 is E-B-C, and with it connected the way you did, it will not oscillate. Swap C and B. The pinout should be on the back of the package, unless RadioShack have gone full-out muppet since the last time I bought stuff there (a long, long time ago...)

The full datasheet for that transistor is here.