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Wire gauge for electromagnet?

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I'm hoping it can take 200 amps. That's the highest setting on the charger. It's not a smart charger. I didn't see any blondes in it.
200 amps? You will be limited by the internal resistance of the other batteries.
The 200 amp starting setting on the charger is limited as to how long you can run it without burning up the charger.
It can only be used for a short time before everything overheats.
 
Hi,

See my post #100 first where i replied to your new two coil config.

You dont want to cause a meltdown either. 200 amps is a lot of current, that's enough to weld.

Also as 4pyros points out, if you use a battery charger the 200 amp setting is probably for a "jump start" or "boost start" where you are only allowed to draw that much current for around 15 seconds. After that you may have to allow for a cool down time of as much as 15 minutes before you can do that again, and that is because of the heating and cooling properties of the transformer they use in the charger. The heating time is much shorter than the cooling time, but you can check your spec's on that charger.
 
Hi again Bronco,

Well i have to apologize for that oversight, what happened was i was pressed for time and had to quickly look over a number of threads both here and in another forum. But had i seen it previously, i would have complemented you and i'll get to that next where i'll have to complement you now :)

As you probably know by now, the window area in a core is pretty much as important as anything else about the core, like material type, center leg cross sectional area, etc. If you fill the window up with winding turns, you've reached a certain limit of the core where you just cant add any more turns, period, and that is a severe limit.

That brings us to your 'old' configuration with one coil versus your 'new' config with two coils on the outer two legs.

The old config had one coil, and turns from that coil simultaneously fill up BOTH windows as each turn is added. The new config though is different in that each turn of an outer winding only fills up ONE window. That means you can fit twice as many turns on the core because you have two windows.
The drawback is that the area of each outer leg is only half of the inner leg, so it would saturate more easily. But given the large coincidental air gap, it is very doubtful if this core could ever saturate unless you get extremely unlucky and happen to have to pick up some material that is made for transformers (that is, has a relatively low reluctance). In that case the core may saturate, but that is probably going to be very rare, and also the mating surface of this unlucky metal would have to be near perfectly flat to match that of the core metal itself.

So lots of applause and hats off to your new configuration, and if you care to you can do some careful testing to see how much stronger it is with the two windings instead of the one single in the center. This of course assumes that each outer leg has the same number of turns as the inner core had before the change in config. If they have half the number of turns as the center leg had, there's not much difference.
Also, the strength may be a little more than twice with the two windings because the total reluctance will be slightly less.

Hey do i get a prize for the 100th post in this thread? :)

Hey MrAl, I am using the same core. I just moved the coil over and added another coil. The core itself is the one that came with the transformer. And I was thinking the same thing about the 100th post. The charger is intermitent on the 200 amp setting and thermally protected. On for 5 sec. and off for 35 sec. And I will only be using the 2 - 6v deep cycle batteries in series.
 
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If they have half the number of turns as the center leg had, there's not much difference.
I suspect that will be the case, if the original coil occupied the whole winding window around the centre leg (and it looks from the pics as though it did).
 
Man this IS a tuff crowd. Not even a chuckle at my blonde jokes. They have the same number of turns. I haven't changed the number of turns on the coils, just moved them from one leg to the other.
 
Just wanted to let you know I like your blonde jokes. :rolleyes:
Have you ever measured the voltage at both ends of your long wire with the magnet hooked up?
 
We are actually a good bunch of Folks...but it is soooo easy to take a thread off topic and then the "Newbie" asking for help is left between a rock and a hard place. And that does not help :wideyed:

Especially in your case Bronco...because that is exactly where you are right now :eek:

All the best,
tvtech
 
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Just wanted to let you know I like your blonde jokes. :rolleyes:
Have you ever measured the voltage at both ends of your long wire with the magnet hooked up?

Thanks ronv. Yes I have. 4-5v no matter how many volts I put out.

We are actually a good bunch of Folks...but it is soooo easy to take a thread off topic and then the "Newbie" asking for help is left between a rock and a hard place. And that does not help :wideyed:

Especially in your case Bronco...because that is exactly where you are right now :eek:

All the best,
tvtech

Yep, but that's ok. Gotta have a little fun once in a while.
 
You can try an old alternator. Most have 6 pressed in diodes.
 
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Hi,

I didnt want to laugh at the blond jokes because i didnt want to offend anyone, and besides the more politically correct term these days is "Hair color challenged" <ha ha ha>

So you moved the center coil to one arm, then what did you put on the other arm the same kind of coil with same turns ?
 
Hi,

I didnt want to laugh at the blond jokes because i didnt want to offend anyone, and besides the more politically correct term these days is "Hair color challenged" <ha ha ha>

So you moved the center coil to one arm, then what did you put on the other arm the same kind of coil with same turns ?

First, the only way to offend a blonde is to NOT laugh at a joke about them. And yes, same kind from another microwave.
 
My latest test results are in.

2 - 6v deep cycle RV batteries wired in series+200' of 12 AWG x3 stranded with 2 wires twisted together conected to one side of the coils and the single wire to the other with 12v RV power converter/5 amp max battery charger gives the strongest lifting capacity. I tried it with the batteries in parallel (no RV converter) and it wouldn't lift a paperclip. What I think I need is a 24v alternator and batteries from a big rig. I can mount the alt. to my air compressor between the motor and compressor. Yes it's big enough. 3hp 220vac.
 
Ok, so I went ahead and put the 35 amp diodes in my friends battery charger in place of the burned out 75 amp diodes. Can anyone guess what happened?
 
Hi,

You mean can anyone NOT guess what happened :)
 
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