Small but High Voltage Generator
Here’s a project that could be useful this summer on the beach, to stop anyone touching your things left on your beach towel while you’ve gone swimming; you might equally well use it at the office or workshop when you go back to work. In a very small space, and powered by simple primary cells or rechargeable batteries, the proposed circuit generates a low-energy, high voltage of the order of around 200 to 400 V, harmless to humans, of course, but still able to give a quite nasty ‘poke’ to anyone who touches it. Quite apart from this practical aspect, this project will also prove instructional for younger hobbyists, enabling them to discover a circuit that all the ‘oldies’ who’ve worked in radio, and having enjoyed valve technology in particular, are bound to be familiar with. As the circuit diagram shows, the project is extremely simple, as it contains only a single active element, and then it’s only a fairly ordinary transistor. As shown here, it operates as a low-frequency oscillator...