Making high-voltage capacitors with your own hands. A Leyden jar or a simple DIY capacitor. Is that all?
HOW TO MAKE A CONSTANT CAPACITY CAPACITOR
It is not difficult to make a constant capacitor. To do this you will need tin foil (tin paper), wax paper and pieces of tin. Staniol foil can be taken from candy or chocolate wrappers, and you can make paraffin paper yourself.
To do this, take thin tissue paper and cut it into strips 50 mm wide and 200-300 mm long.
The strips are immersed for 2-3 minutes in molten paraffin (not boiling). As soon as they are taken out, the paraffin immediately hardens. After this, you need to carefully scrape it off with the blunt side of a knife so as not to tear the paper. The resulting waxed sheets are obtained.
Rice. 111. Homemade constant capacitor.
For the capacitor, the waxed paper is folded in the letter “I”, as shown in Figure 111, and staniol sheets measuring 45X30 mm are placed in the gaps on both sides of the accordion.
When all the sheets are inserted, the “accordion” is folded and ironed with a heated iron. The staniol ends remaining on the outside are connected to each other.
The best way to do this is to cut out two plates from thick cardboard, place them on both sides of the “accordion” and clamp them with two clips made of tin or brass. You need to solder conductors to the frames, with the help of which the capacitor is soldered during installation.
With ten staniol leaves, the capacitance of the capacitor will be approximately equal to 1,000 pF.
If the number of leaves is doubled, the capacitance of the capacitor will also approximately double.
In this way, you can make capacitors with a capacity of 100 to 5 tpf.
High-capacity capacitors from 5 tpf to 0.2 μf are made slightly differently. To make them, you will need an old paper microfarad capacitor.
A paper capacitor is a roll of tape consisting of two strips of waxed paper and two strips of staniol foil sandwiched between them.
In order to determine the length of the strip required
For a capacitor, we use the formula:C
l = 0.014 ---
a
In this formula, C is the capacitance of the capacitor we need in pf; a is the width of the staniol foil strip in cm; l is the length of the foil strip in cm. For example, to obtain a capacitor with a capacity of 10 tpf with a strip width of 4 cm required length stripes will be equal to:
10 000l = 0.014 ----------- = 35 cm.
4
The capacitor is made as follows; From a roll of microfarad capacitor (Fig. 112) we unwind a tape of the length we need (all four strips). To prevent the capacitor plates from connecting to each other, at the beginning and at the end of the tape, the staniol foil is cut 10 mm larger than the paper.
Before rolling the tape, from each strip
foil makes the output thin stranded wire or tinned copper foil. The output from one plate is placed at the beginning of the tape, and from the other - at the end and in the opposite side. Then the tape is rolled into a tube and glued on top thick paper. The paper for gluing is taken 10 mm wider than the tape. Two rigid mounting conductors are embedded on the protruding edges of the paper.Leads from the capacitor plates are soldered to these conductors from the inside of the paper sleeve, as shown in the figure.
The finished capacitor is filled with paraffin.
How to make a capacitor?
There is an inventor in the soul of each of us, and therefore amateur radio is a fairly popular hobby. Self-production radio components are one of the most interesting components of this hobby. In this article we will talk about how to make a capacitor with your own hands at home.
Materials
To make a capacitor we need:
- foil,
- iron,
- papyrus paper,
- paraffin,
- lighter.
The foil does not need additional preparation, but with the help of the last three components we have to make waxed paper.
Manufacturing
So, the materials are prepared, let's get to work:
- We heat the paraffin and carefully process the papyrus paper.
- We fold it into an “accordion”, the width of each section of which is about 30 mm. The number of accordion layers determines the capacitance of the capacitor; each layer corresponds to approximately 100 pF.
- In each section we put a piece of foil with an area of 30 by 45 mm.
- Fold the accordion and iron it with a warm iron.
- That's it, the capacitor is ready! The pieces of foil peeking out are the connecting contacts of our capacitor, through which it can be connected to the circuit.
We received the simplest household capacitor, but it is worth noting that the thicker and better the foil, the higher voltage it will be. However, we draw your attention to the fact that it is better not to try to make a capacitor at home that can withstand more than 50 kV at home. “Amateur professionals” advise, if you want to get close to this value, to use lamination bags as a dielectric, but you will need a laminator to heat them.
Fans of various high-voltage experiments often encounter a problem when it is necessary to use high-voltage capacitors. As a rule, such capacitors are very difficult to find, and if you do, you will have to pay a lot of money for them, which not everyone can afford. In addition, the policy of our site simply will not allow you to spend money on buying something that you can make yourself without leaving your home.
As you may have guessed, we decided to devote this material to the assembly of a high-voltage capacitor, which is also the subject of the author’s video, which we invite you to watch before starting work.
What do we need:
- knife;
- what we will use as a dielectric;
- food foil;
- a device for measuring capacitance.
Let us immediately note that the author of the homemade capacitor uses the most ordinary self-adhesive wallpaper as a dielectric. As for the device for measuring capacitance, its use is not necessary, since this device is intended only so that in the end you can find out what happened in the end. Everything is clear with the materials, you can start assembling a homemade capacitor.
First of all, cut off two pieces of self-adhesive wallpaper. You need about half a meter, but it is desirable that one strip is slightly longer than the other.
The resulting sheet of foil is cut into exactly two parts lengthwise.
The next thing is to place one piece of wallpaper on a flat surface, on which we carefully place one piece of food foil. The foil should be placed so that there is a gap of about a centimeter along the three edges. On the fourth side the foil will stick out, which is quite normal at this stage.
Place a second sheet of wallpaper on top.
Place a second sheet of foil on it. Only this time we make sure that the foil protrudes from the side opposite to the previous step. That is, if the author had the first piece protruding from the bottom, then this time it should protrude from the top. Separately, it should be noted that the foil sheets should not touch each other.
Now we remove the backing from one edge and glue our capacitor.
This element is rightfully considered extremely versatile, since it can simultaneously be used in the manufacture and repair of a wide variety of devices. And even if you purchase it already finished form will not be difficult; many amateur craftsmen are happy to experiment, trying or even successfully making a capacitor with their own hands. Everything you need to create a homemade capacitor is described in detail above and, in principle, with none of the necessary elements There should not be any difficulties, since they may be available on the farm or, at worst, on free sale. The only exception, perhaps, is paraffin paper, which is usually made independently using materials such as paraffin, papyrus and a disposable lighter (alternatively, you can use any other safe source of open flame).
So, in order to process the paper properly, you should carefully heat the paraffin using a fire and walk its softened part over the entire surface of the papyrus on both sides. After the work is completed and the material has set properly, the resulting paraffin paper must be folded like an accordion (meaning transverse advance). The technique is common, but it requires maintaining a certain step (every three centimeters) and in order to make the fold line extremely accurate, it is advisable to outline the first strip with a simple pencil before initialing. You can continue in the same spirit, completely outlining the entire sheet, or act, focusing solely on the first segment (as convenient for you). As for the number of layers required, this indicator is determined solely by the capacity of the future product.
At this stage, the formed accordion should be put aside for a while in order to begin preparing rectangular pieces of foil, the dimensions of which should correspond in this case to the given 3 by 4.5 centimeters. These blanks are necessary to complete the metal layer of the capacitor, therefore, upon completion of the above work, the foil is inserted into all layers of the accordion, making sure that it is evenly laid, after which they begin to iron the folded blank using a regular iron. Paraffin and foil should do their job, ensuring strong adhesion to each other (other methods for soldering a capacitor at home are not practiced), after which the capacitor can be considered absolutely ready. As for the foil elements protruding beyond the former accordion, it should not give cause for concern, since they play the role of connecting contacts.
It is with the help of these small-sized fragments that the with my own hands The capacitor can be fully used by connecting it to an electrical circuit. Naturally, we are talking about a primitive device and in order to somehow improve its performance, it is necessary to use higher quality foil that has high density, although here it is extremely important not to overdo it, since there are certain limits on the voltage used for crafts for adults of this kind. So, for example, it is better not to experiment by trying to make a capacitor with your own hands that can accept too high a voltage (more than 50 Volts), although some “homemade” people manage to get around this side of the issue by using lamination bags instead of standard dielectrics, as well as a laminator for safe soldering.
There are several more methods on how to make a homemade capacitor, and one of them involves working with more high voltage. This includes the famous “Glass” technique, the name of which comes from the means at hand - a faceted glass. This element is necessary for covering with foil on the inside and outside, and this should be done in such a way that the used fragments of material do not touch each other. The design itself, in its already “assembled” form, necessarily provides for the presence of inlets, after which it can be considered completely ready for use for its intended purpose. At the same time, when connecting it to the circuit, all necessary safety measures must be carefully observed in order to avoid possible negative consequences.
Alternatively, you can try to make a more advanced design with your own hands, using such improvised means as glass plates of the same size, the same good old high-density foil and epoxy resins, designed for reliable connection of the listed materials with each other. The undoubted advantage of such a homemade capacitor is that it is capable of carrying out more quality work, as they say, “without breakdown”. However, as you know, there is usually a fly in the ointment in a barrel of honey, and in this case it directly concerns one thing significant shortcoming of this invention, which lies in its more than impressive dimensions, which makes keeping such a “colossus” at home not very convenient and rational.
Good afternoon Today I would like to show you how to make a Leyden jar, a simple device in which you can store an electrical charge.
Static electricity is simply a lack or excess of electrons on the surface of an object.
One of the ways of education static electricity- contact of two dissimilar objects. Many people remember the experiment with an ebonite stick from school. If you rub it with wool, some of the electrons will transfer to the stick and the wool will remain positively charged, and the stick, due to an excess of electrons, will be negatively charged and will be able to attract light objects.
In everyday life, this situation occurs, for example, when combing your hair with a comb. You can even hear the electrostatic discharges crackling. By the way, did you know that such clicks have a voltage of several thousand volts? It turns out that with the help of an ordinary comb you can get just a huge amount of tension. Only the charge that a comb can hold is very, very small. The charge from the comb can be accumulated elsewhere. For example, in the Leiden Bank. A Leyden jar is essentially the simplest capacitor (two conductors separated by an insulator.
Let's start making
Materials
The classic Leyden jar is usually made from a glass jar, but its walls are too thick and the charge does not accumulate very much. Therefore, we will use a plastic jar with thin walls. We will use as a conductor food foil, or chocolate foil.
Step 1
The jar needs to be covered with an even layer of foil approximately two-thirds of the way up, including the bottom itself. Avoid large folds and tears.
Step 2
Now the same thing needs to be done from the inside, to the same height as the outer lining.
Step 3
Attach a foil receiver in the center of the jar, which should touch the foil inside the jar. Upper part need to be taken out of the can.
If you are too lazy to bother with gluing the inside of the jar, then you can simply pour salt solution there exactly to the level to which the foil is glued on the outside. (The receiver should touch the water at one end
So, now we have somewhere to accumulate the charge from the comb. To do this, grasp the outer lining with one hand and move the loaded comb near the receiver with the other hand.
You can discharge the can onto yourself by holding the lining with your hand and placing your finger towards the receiver. You can also make this cool spark gap from a piece of foil, which will give a more even and beautiful spark.
Note: to break down 1mm of air you need a voltage of one thousand volts. By the way, air humidity critically affects the length of the spark (the drier your apartment, the longer the spark will be).
