Cheap/free capacitor bank and charger

Step 2 Take out the camera board

Alright, so take apart one of the cameras, and look at the top right of the back of the board. Hopefully it's an LED, but if it's not, just try the next camera. I got 5 Kodak cameras, two of them had LED boards.

Assuming you have an LED charging circuit, let's see the important parts. There are the battery contacts, +1.5v and ground, the LED out, ~+2.8v and ground, and the capacitor contacts, +480v and ground. We also want to get rid of the xenon bulb, it adds a lot of thickness.

So I started with the capacitor, heat it up with the soldering iron and pull it out. Then I went to the battery contacts, there is a ton of metal on one of them, just rip it off with pliers, apply heat on the other side and pull it out. The LED contacts are by far the hardest part, they are very close together. Finally, take off the plastic over the xenon flash bulb (not done in this picture), and desolder the bulb.

Comments

[StartedBullet]

Any idea where I can get these cameras free? Walmart will not give them away.

[blueeyesseto]

if anyone can get a large amount of these used disposable cameras say 50 i am willing to pay $10 for them seeing that your getting them for free and that should cover shipping

[Obi-Wan14]

Does anyone knows a way to replace the disposable camera board?
so I mean what do I need to make if I don't want to use the camera board?
Thanks!

[freerunnin1]

a mini transformer, a large capacitor, LED, battery pack and some switches

[h8redflip]

hi, what can i use instead of the camera board? (i want to get it down to basics, like the individual components, and maybe the theory behind them, as i cannot for the life of me workout how a 1.5v battery can charge one or more capacitors to 330v (or anything over 1.5v) - i get the feeling im missing something simple even though ive spent bours researching this.
and ive got a variable dc plus which im setting at 12v and charging a 330v capacitor with it, but it only reaches 12v, so how does this 'camera circuit' achieve the extra 328.5v?

[randomapps]

probably with a chip like the 555 timer to create sine wave (ac) then pushed through a coil of some sort like the coil to create the thousands of volts for the spark plugs in your car (how to i get 2000 volts from a 12 volt battery?!!!!)

[ElliotM]

In case yall are still wondering, as I understand the camera circuit converts the dc input of 1.5 v into AC using a specific type of oscillator transistor, producing the high pitch whirring noise as the transistor switches back and forth. This AC current then goes to a small step up transformer, which boosts the voltage to the 330v. The explanation for how a transformer works can be very complicated, but the quick and dirty five minute explanation is that the input end uses coils of wire around a ferromagnetic object of some sort, usually a ring or something similiar, turning it into an electromagnet when current is passed through the coil. This coil is insulated from the ring, which carries no electricity itself. On the other side of this ring, the output end, another coil of wire is wrapped around the ring. The ratio of input to output wires determines how much the voltage is stepped up, for instance a 1 to 10 ratio between input and output would mean the output voltage is 10 times greater. From there, the output goes to the capacitor and begins storing the charge. I hope this helps, if youre still curious, HowStuffWorks has a great explanation for camera flashes on their website. Good luck building and dont zap yourself!

[uberdum05]

I know a good way to get a LED out, press the soldering iron in the middle of the LED contacts so it touches them.Then get some pliers and pull out the LED and if you're lucky, it might just drop out!