Charge Your Cellphone Using Wasted Heat (and Build a Steampunk Wall-E)

Step 3 Parts List (5V regulator)

Here are the parts we used.

Heat sink - Radioshack or from an old computer. http://www.radioshack.com/search/index.jsp?kwCatId=&kw=heatsink&origkw=heatsink&sr=1

Thermal Paste - We got ours from dealextreme.com. Its not the best, but it was cheap and offered free shipping. A higher grade thermal paste would have improved it. http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2526910

5V Regulator, LM7805 - This can also be purchased from Radioshack, as you can see, our's was. http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2062599

0.33uF Capacitor - Radioshack or your favorite electronics store. (optional...ish)

0.1uF Capacitor - Radioshack or your favorite electronics store. (optional...ish)

USB female plug - We used a USB plug salvaged from a motherboard, but you can use anything that fits the device you would like to charge. Its actually easier to cut up a USB extension cord that has the USB receptacle plug.

Seebeck unit - http://tellurex.com

Comments

[spartans]

 hey this project is really good and i want to try it once.
hey why are these capacitors used for?

[nachos]

 will this one work?  tinyurl.com/yffb978    
its a peltier

Thanx in advance

[alkaline9500]

Great project! They also sell cheap USB extenders at the dollar store.

[splitreaction]

I bought one of those once and got really disappointed. Good USB 2.0 cables have two layers of shielding, a foil and a braid for better signal quality, I cut the usb cable from the dollar store apart and found only 4 wires and no shielding. It may be sufficient for small stuff, but high data rate transmissions will get glitched with those dollar store cables. I sometimes use them for the connector when I'm building a charger since mine don't transmit data

[DualPhase]

Will this step up from any voltage, say 1v? Do you know the efficiency percentage?

[splitreaction]

Which part of the instructable are you referring to?

The boost circuit will step up from 0.8V, but its efficiency depends on the load current.

At 1V the spec sheet doesn't specify an efficiency at that 1 volt. At 2.5V with an optomized design and a current load of 100ma it would be 85% eff from Vin to Vout. Realistically at 1v I would predict less than 65% efficiency. Boost don't tend to be very efficient especially at low voltages.

I seriously doubt the peltier will be able to supply that much current to maintain that regulation with 100mA at 1V

datasheet
http://www.instructables.com/files/orig/FA8/3QVR/FT7PRXIN/FA83QVRFT7PRXIN.pdf

[DualPhase]

Perfect. I ordered a few of them. Thanks

[Kryptonite]

I went to tellurex.com but you didn't say which model of seebeck unit we should use.

[splitreaction]

The model number is: G1-1.4-219-1.14. When you get to the site, click on "Thermoelectric Power Generation Modules", it should be the last one on the list that comes up. I thought we listed it in step two, but I may be wrong. Thanks.

[Kryptonite]

Cool, thank you! I really want to do this but right now I don't have enough money, so when I start it I'll inform you.