> Thanks so much! This is all super informative. And especially edifying for > someone like me, who hasn't yet had much experience. I'll be making more high > voltage supplies in the future, so everything you've showed me will come in > handy more and more as I continue. > > I was also looking into boosting the voltage to 30V before using the original > schematic, per your first post, and I found these boost converters: > https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01GRIQBRY/ref=asc_df_B01GRIQBRY5072525/?tag=hyprod-20&creative=395033&creativeASIN=B01GRIQBRY&linkCode=df0&hvadid=198076677096&hvpos=1o2&hvnetw=g&hvrand=13981072561463713758&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9006850&hvtargid=pla-319429339171 > > Do you think those would work? Or would its efficiency or rate impair the > operation of the second circuit?
While that would work, it seems unnecessarily complex. On the one hand, you're using an entire second boost power supply instead of a couple of capacitors and diodes. On another hand, if you're willing to buy a completed module, it's easier (and probably cheaper) to just buy a 12V-300V converter and be done with it. On the gripping hand, if you're going to need a power supply to run the thing in the first place, why not start with a 30V supply? That said, the only modification needed to run on 30V in is to add some sort of regulation to provide a lower voltage supply to the control chip (whether it's a 555 or some other one, I don't think any of the usual ones can run on 30V). This can be either a dedicated voltage regulator (I think a switching supply would be silly here, so I'd just use a simple linear regulator that can accept the input voltage and won't dissipate too much heat), or a simple zener shunt regulator. For the sake of completeness, I'll mention yet another method of getting more voltage step-up: instead of an inductor-based supply, you can build a transformer-based one, which allows you to get voltage multiplication from both the flyback effect and the transformer turns ratio (harking back to another recent discussion on this group). Many commercial supplies work this way, as the engineering effort and production costs of a custom transformer make sense with volume production. For hobbyist use, however, it can be considerably less practical. Then again, you can get an off-the-shelf mains transformer that will give you enough voltage out to rectify to 300V easily. The advantages are that it's a very simple reliable circuit with few components. The disadvantages are that it's bulky, expensive, somewhat more dangerous, and more difficult to make into a variable voltage supply. - John -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "neonixie-l" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web, visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/neonixie-l/7C378D67-999F-4F5E-8A64-75D94F7D900C%40mac.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
