This simple 20 watt homemade tube light circuit should work with any 12V battery and uses real few components yet is still able to produce a decent amount of white light. There components used are super common and can be easily founded at your local electronic store.
The general idea is simple! The secondary coil of Tr1 and T1 with all the other stuff together make a high frequency oscillator circuit.
How the Circuits Works
This oscillation forces an AC current into the secondary coil of the transformer, which then gets pushed back into the first coil of the transformer and gets jacked way up to the transformer's rated voltage.
The transformer you need is just a regular 12-0-12 volt, 1 amp one, you can probably dig one out of that old, junky power supply unit gathering dust in your electronics graveyard.
The transistor is also just a normal type, here we show a 2N6101, but any other one that's kinda similar will work too. You could even try a 2N3055 transistor or even a D1351 instead.
The 2.5k preset is there to mess with the frequency of the circuit, which in turn messes with how bright the light is. This preset needs to be fiddled with real careful to get the light as bright as possible without sucking up too much battery.
The 0.47uF capacitor is also thrown in to help the light output be even better, you can try other values close to this one to see if it makes the light even brighter overall.
A 12V, 7 amp hour battery should last a good long time, but don't expect this circuit to make the light as bright as it normally is. When I messed around with this circuit, I could never get the light tube to be as bright as it's supposed to be.
The picture below shows how to build this simple 20 watt fluorescent tube, 12V converter circuit.
Circuit Diagram
Parts List
- Resistors are 1/4 watt 5% CFR
- 680 Ω = 1
- Potentiometer 2.5 kΩ = 1
- PPC Capacitor 0.47 µF / 50 V = 1
- Transistor 2N6101 or any equivalent = 1
- Transformer 12-0-12 V / 1 A = 1
- Fluorescent Tube Light 20 Watt = 1
- Battery 12 V / 7 Ah = 1