Introduction: Joule Thief LED Night Light

About: I am an electronic artist living in Upstate New York. I work with LEDs, microcontrollers, and analog electronics to create objects that I find beautiful.


I have many used batteries around. Remote controls, cameras, many electronic gadgets all use batteries, mostly AA size. I always felt guilty for throwing away the used batteries. I know there are rechargeable batteries, but many electronics don't work well with rechargeables.

I also know that those "used" or "spent" batteries usually have some juice left in them. So to come up with a good use of used batteries, I've created a LED night light.

I like having a little night light on when I sleep. LEDs are perfect for this purpose, because they are energy efficient, and good at providing low intensity illumination.

This LED night light operates with just one battery. It utilizes a little circuit called Joule Thief to boost voltage out of an AA battery. I also added a light sensor to turn it on automatically when the surrounding is dark.

The circuit is energy efficient, and requires very low voltage to work. So it effectively sucks every bit of energy out of batteries. This type of circuit is often called "Joule Thief", because it works as though stealing every bit of energy (Joule is a unit for energy) out of battery.

I'm calling this project Night Joule Thief.

*The kit purchasing info can be found here: https://www.theledart.com/products/night-joule-thief-led-night-light-kit

Step 1: Features

Here are the highlights of the Night Joule Thief.

  • Compact & streamlined design
  • Uses only one AA battery (or any 1.5V battery you can hook up to)
  • Easily adaptable to different size batteries - hook up holes to attach home made clips
  • Two white LEDs
  • Automatic turn on via a light sensor (adjustable sensitivity level)
  • Energy efficient - works even with a run-down battery, down to 0.6V
  • Choice of through-hole only components or SMD - mix & match on the same PCB

Step 2: Technical Overview

"Joule Thief" circuit is an inductor based voltage booster circuit to light LEDs with low supply voltage. As most of you know LEDs need higher than 2V (3V for white LEDs), so usually at least two batteries are needed to light them. The "Joule Thief" circuit was published in 1999 and has been quite popular. You can see the principle of the circuit here. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joule_thief

My version is a variation that uses single coil inductor, to make the inductor easily obtainable. I designed the circuit using readily available parts only, to make it an ideal DIY project.

Circuit

The L1, Q2, Q3, C1, R2, and LEDs D1 & D2 make the Joule Thief. And the Q1, and the rest of the parts form the light sensor. CdS is the device that actually senses the light and change its resistance accordingly. When the surrounding of CdS is bright, it has low resistance (anywhere around 1k to 3k ohm), and when the surrounding is dark, the resistance goes up to 100k to 3M ohm range. So in this circuit, the base voltage of Q1 is controlled by the ambient light level. When the base voltage of Q1 goes more than 0.6V below the power supply(battery) voltage, current goes through R1, turning the Joule Thief circuit on.

The Joule Thief circuit is boosting the battery voltage up to over 6V to light two LEDs in series. LEDs light up with the battery voltage as low as 0.6V! Amazing!

PCB layout can be downloaded as an editable PDF, so you can etch your own board if you like. Custom 2 layer PCB and kit are available for sale as well. The 2 layer PCBs have extra front pads for SMD where possible, so you can build the same circuit with SMD parts as you wish.

Parts List
1x CdS Photoresistor (rated 3k - 0.3M ohm) (CDS1)
1x 1k ohm (R1)
1x 100k ohm (R2)
1x 10k ohm (R3)
1x 50k ohm trim pot (VR1)
1x 22pF (C1)
1x 470uH (L1) (anywhere between 22 - 470uH would work - might have to reduce the C1 value however)
1x 2N5401 or equivalent (Q1) (or just about any general purpose PNP transistor, such as PN2907, 2N3906, etc...)
2x MPSA06 or equivalent (Q2, Q3) (or just about any general purpose NPN transistor, such as PN2222A, 2N3904, 2N4400, etc...)
2x LED (D1, D2) (Just about any LEDs can be used)
2x Battery Clips

Step 3: Assembly

The assembly is very straight forward. Insert the parts into the PCB, and solder them. Start with smaller components, follow the order listed below.

Parts List (in assembly order)
1x 1k ohm (Brown - Black - Red - Gold) (R1)
1x 100k ohm (Brown - Black - Yellow - Gold) (R2)
1x 10k ohm (Brown - Black - Orange - Gold) (R3)
1x CdS Photoresistor (rated 3k - 0.3M ohm) (CDS1)
1x 50k ohm trim pot (VR1)
1x 22pF (C1)
1x 470uH (L1)
1x 2N5401 or equivalent (Q1)
2x MPSA06 or equivalent (Q2, Q3)
2x LED (D1, D2)
2x Battery Clips

Transistors and LEDs have polarities, so make sure to insert them in the correct orientation. Battery holders need a bit of force to snap into the holes. They attach from the back side of PCB as you can see in the picture.

Once everything is soldered in place, double check the part placement, orientation and solder joints. Then insert a battery. The polarity is marked on the front side of PCB.
If you don't see the LEDs light up, don't worry. The room is probably too bright. Take a piece of black paper or tape and block the light from hitting CdS light sensor. (and/or darken the room) If the LEDs still don't come on, turn the trimmer (the little orange thing) with a screw driver, counter clockwise. This makes the sensor less sensitive to light, so the LEDs will come on by just placing the sensor under shade, or turning off the room light.

View the step by step pictures of assembly here: https://www.instructables.com/id/Joule-Thief-LED-Night-Light-Kit-Step-by-Step/

Step 4: Performance

This little night light performs very well. For starters, the brightness is not bad for using just one AA battery. I've been using these as flashlights as well.

The light sensor also works very well. Once adjusted, the light is steadily off during the day, even when you put the sensor under shade. Only when you block the sensor by a black object, the light would turn on. Yet after dusk, the light would come on when you turn off the room light.

A fresh battery lasts for weeks if only used as a night light. And the best use of this light is to "revive" used batteries. Those batteries from remote controls, cameras, etc. usually have quite a bit of juice left in them. Joule Thief sucks the juice out of those batteries till the last drop. It's like getting free energy when you can use something that were going to be thrown out.

Step 5: PCB & Kit

If you are handy, you can etch your own PCB, and build this night light entirely DIY.

However, to spread the goodness of Joule Thief and to contribute to the greener earth, I am putting together the PCB & kit available.

The details can be found here: https://www.theledart.com/products/night-joule-thief-led-night-light-kit

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