The above diagram is known to contain some flaws and it is recomended you take more notice of the follow diagram from the US patent as below
Tate Ambient Power Module. Joseph Tate Last Known Address 760 Waldo Point Sausalito Ca (4965) 415 331 8150 332 9918 U.S. Patent 4,628,299
This design converts radio frequency energy to power that can be usefully applied in power devices such as clocks,radios and smoke detectors.
This design makes use of a doubler, splitter and rectifier.
The device has been known to give 36 volt/9 watts.
This devices does away for the need for batteries by extracting energy from natural and man made radio waves.
THe device uses a coil made of the following design 479 turns of #22 wire on a 3" plastic tube, the coil should be loosely wound as a close wound coil tends to reduce power collection. One end should be connected to unit at antenna connection point and the other to an antenna of your choice .
Other coil types could be used in your experiments such as sliding induction coils that is inside one another and find the best position by moving them in different positions.
Other coil types can be found by referencing any good book on radio fundamentals. Check out the Telsa type coils as well.
Power could be also enhanced by placing a tin foil pyramid under the coil as this seems to also improve power.
The power produced also seems to improve near bridges,ships and any thing containing a great deal of metal.
A high antenna wire seems to improve the running of unit although a 7 foot whip antenna worked reasonably well too.
A interesting side line is the inventor claims to be able to detect earthquakes by the rise and fall of energy levels.
Subject: Re: [nuenergy] Re: Tate power ambient circuit update Reply-To: nuenergy@yahoogroups.com
Geoff , the reason the power is so low is the capacitors being used. If larger capacitors such as used for power audio systems or the newer super capacitors such as the 50-500 Farad units You will begin to see real power. The schematics shows a great deal of naivety on the part of the Inventor and the issuing Patent Office. The basic idea is 1000% It relates to My Earth Electrical System II from 15 years ago.
from an email recieved from Don L.Smith
and from another experiementer Hey thanks for improving the information on the Ambient power module you have at your site.
Remember I e-mailed to you recently about the capacitor values missing.
That extra info is quite helpful and using larger capacitors definatly increases power as I have seen in my own tests on my circuit.
Hey another cool thing I found is that if you earth both the earth of the circuit to ground and the other end of the antenna to a separate ground, you increase the power dramaticaly, compared to using a normal antenna and coil. I made a similar coil to the one mentioned on the ambient power web page but it didn't help.
I have tested and found that the power output is greatly related to how large your capacitors are and how well grounded your antenna and circuit grounds are. A metal stake shoved in the ground provides a reasonable ground. But I found that it is much better to get the largest surface area of metal in contact with the ground as possible. I even tryed digging a hole and planting aluminium foil sheets in the ground. That worked quite well. At the moment I am using the earth of the house for the circuit earth and a metal fence for the antenna earth. This is working great.
Note that the ground of the circuit and the antenna gound have to be separate. They cannot be connected in any way other than physical earth.
So far I am using 470uF capacitors and IN60 germanium diodes as they have a low voltage drop and the capacitors collect more current compared to 47uF. I also replaced the 0.2uF capacitors in the original diagram to 47uF capacitors aswell. I also intend to replace them all to much higher capacitor values. Although the mentioned 50-500 farred capacitors on the web site cost a fortune as each one costs $1000+ each and I would need 12 of them.
The first circuit showen on the web page that had the problem with the diode, I fixed and is running quite well. I have included a picture of the fixed circuit in this e-mail as an attatchment if you would like to have a look at it.
If you have a look at the circuit you will see that it is the diode in red that has been fixed. This circuit has been test run with a computer program as well as practicaly. An example output of current and voltage measurements is also included along with a load (The light bulb). Unfortunatly practicly I havn't been able to collect that much current yet. Although I am working on it. But I have been able to get up to 27 volts with this design.
At the moment the circuit runs nicely as a night light although it is probably too bright to be used as I night light. I use an 8000 mcd white LED which is definatly bright. But I know that I will inprove the circuit further and will hopefully be able to power more than just an LED.
Again thanks for updating the Ambient power page. Your doing a great job. Thanks.
