John Wiltrout's Blog

Today was a Great Day

jw0752

This summer my Grandson Ivan has been coming to spend the day with me twice a week. Ivan is a very serious 10 year old with an interest in electronics. I always try to have a plan in place with experiments and activities. These have gone well with Iv...
- 26 Jul 2017
Process Duration Timer Blog 1 (The Timer)

jw0752

This is going to be an update and expansion of range for a test device I built and posted on the forum two years ago. Battle of the Batteries - E*** vs D*** vs Bargain The device that I built for that blog was designed to monitor a battery...
- 24 Jul 2017
Thank You Wilfred Klatt

jw0752

As I was rummaging through some of my stuff this evening I came across this old General Electric Photo Electric Relay that was given to me 60 years ago. I wondered if it still worked so I hooked it up. It did not work so I began to troubl...
- 10 Jul 2017
Hacking a Chinese Soldering Iron

jw0752

A couple weeks ago I received a really nice Tenma Soldering iron from a friend. The other night while I was looking through the Banggood Electronics I came across a very inexpensive solder iron that reminded me of the handpiece of my new iron. ...
- 24 Jun 2017
Mechanical Current Regulator

jw0752

In the good old days (I remember them well) we didn't use any of the newfangled highfalutin semi conductors to regulate current. When necessary for short term precision current regulation we used a mechanical current regulator like this one:&nbsp...
- 17 Jun 2017
Tenma 21-10115 Temperature Controlled Soldering Station

jw0752

Thanks to a gift from a good friend I have for the first time in my 60 year walk with electronics a temperature controlled solder station Up until now it has always been one or two unregulated power levels As is the case with most of the things we ar...
- 14 Jun 2017
Correcting the Little Irritations

jw0752

There are two stations at my main work bench. The first station is for bread boarding and testing components, circuits and prototypes. The bulk of my test equipment is arranged at this end of the bench. The other end of the bench is set up for solder...
- 13 Jun 2017
Shop Tips - Lint Roller Clean Up

jw0752

It has been a while since I did the last Shop Tip Blog. These are blogs about some of the simple things I have discovered that make working in my shop a little easier. Today I realized that I had not mentioned how useful a Lint Roller can be. Wh...
- 23 May 2017
It's Not Just the ESD (Static)

jw0752

I had a very challenging time last night. I have been working on producing a decent prototype of a machine I described in a previous blog. https://www.element14.com/community/people/jw0752/blog/2017/04/17/prototyping-an-emdr-machine The con...
- 18 May 2017
Unusual Way to Wire a small DC Motor

jw0752

Despite 60 years of playing with electronics this is the first time I have seen a DC motor wired in this fashion. At first I did not expect it to work on DC current but to my surprise it took off and ran perfectly. Furthermore it did not matter...
- 4 May 2017
Building the DSO Shell 15001K Oscilloscope

jw0752

If you are looking for an inexpensive kit build project that comes together nicely and works well to boot check out the DSO Shell 15001K Oscilloscope Kit. https://www.banggood.com/Orignal-JYE-Tech-DS0150-15001K-DSO-SHELL-DIY-Digital-Oscilloscope...
- 25 Apr 2017
Zener & LED Tester

jw0752

While sorting out and reorganizing my collection of mostly salvaged zeners the other day I began to imagine what I would have to do to make a simple tester. In the past I have set up the power supply, milliammeter, voltmeter, and a variety of current...
- 24 Apr 2017
Prototyping an EMDR Machine

jw0752

One of my Grandsons recently was telling me about a type of psychotherapy that is used to treat PTSD and other traumatic incidents called EMDR, Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing. He described a machine that was being used by therapists th...
- 17 Apr 2017
Unusual Circuit board configuation

jw0752

I was busy salvaging a bunch of Dental electronic equipment for interesting parts when I came across this interesting circuit board construction and I thought you might get a kick out of it. This is a driver circuit...
- 27 Mar 2017
Hacking a Toroidal Transformer

jw0752

I have this beautiful Toroidal Transformer but it is 19 Volts and I need 24 Volts for my application. It has a nice big donut hole and I have plenty of 16 GA solid enameled wire so I decided to add a few more windings. The first step was ...
- 15 Mar 2017
Room Temperature to 350 Degree C Hot Air Source - for Component Testing

jw0752

There have been many times when I have wished that I had a hot air heat source that could be controlled. The rework station has a controlled heat source but it will not work below 100 C. For this project I have decided to build a modified hot air gun...
- 7 Mar 2017
Using Extremely Sophisticated Electronics to Solve a Real World Problem

jw0752

If you don't want to be disappointed by this blog don't read any further cause I lied. The problem is that I have just signed up for a new Garbage Service. The new bin is to be left on the curb by my house in a very specific position so ...
- 4 Mar 2017
Incorporating the LT 4320 Ideal Bridge in the Linear Bench Supply

jw0752

A while back I explored the Ideal Bridge available using the LT 4320 Controller and 4 N Channel MOSFETs. https://www.element14.com/community/people/jw0752/blog/2017/02/01/exploring-the-lt4320-ideal-diode-bridge-controller I also built a two...
- 3 Mar 2017
Comparing Power Supplies

jw0752

I recently built a couple of Bench Power Supplies using salvaged parts and inexpensive kits and modules from the Chinese electronics suppliers. I Blogged about these builds here on element-14. https://www.element14.com/community/people/jw0752/bl...
- 12 Feb 2017
Oh No! Not another #@&%# Power Supply

jw0752

Sorry I couldn't Resist. It all started when I ordered a couple of these kits from Bangood in China: http://www.banggood.com/0-30V-2mA-3A-Adjustable-DC-Regulated-Power-Supply-DIY-Kit-p-958308.html?rmmds=myorder At $6.87 inclu...
- 11 Feb 2017
Exploring the LT4320 Ideal Diode Bridge Controller

jw0752

A while back I heard that a diode full wave bridge could be replaced with MOSFETs that were switched in the proper sequence. The advantage of doing this would be the very low Rds(on) available from the MOSFETs which results in much lower waste heat g...
- 1 Feb 2017
Using the Coarse + Fine Control circuit in my new Dual Bench Supply

jw0752

A couple weeks ago I asked the forum for some ideas for a Coarse/Fine adjustment circuit for a basic bench power supply that I was going to build. While the power supply is nothing special and the build was rather routine I thought it might be fun to...
- 24 Jan 2017
The small challenges in life. Fixing a bad CFL

jw0752

The Compact Flourescent Light or more commonly a CFL. For some time I have been popping open the ones that go bad and salvaging the board components. This one stopped making light but I could see that the small filament heaters at the two ...
- 24 Dec 2016
Sticky Analog Voltmeter

jw0752

I happened to notice the other day that an analog voltmeter that I built a couple years ago was reading 10 volts. Now this alone would not have been of any concern except for the fact that the power supply was not turned on nor had it been turned on ...
- 18 Dec 2016
Analgesic Pain Cream Dispenser

jw0752

By now everyone knows that my Mom is my greatest inspiration. As she continues to degenerate with Parkinson's Disease I continue to try to come up with technology to make her daily activities easier. For some time now she has been fighting with the t...
- 4 Dec 2016