I have been trying to make a flashing led circuit using a 555 timer. I have not been having much luck. I set it up on my bread board as shown here. except that I am just running one led not two so I omit one of the leds and one of the resistors. the resistors that I did use were both 10k. I tried several different capacitors but none of them worked right. I tried electrolytic ones from 10μf to 100μf, using them the led stayed on. I tried some plastic film ones with the same results. some of the ceramic ones that I tried made the timer run one cycle but didn't repeat, so when I put power to the circuit the led stayed on for 10 seconds then turned off and stayed off.
I have also tryed to set it up as shown on some videos on Youtube and had an equal amount of success.
One really strange thing happened while I had it set up as I described first (not the one from youtube). Once I left the power on to the circuit while I changed capacitors and as I was putting the new capacitor in (before I had made contact and wasn't touching anything) the led came on!!! After some experimenting I figured out that if I left everything normal except for no capacitor and then moved my finger close to but not touching the insulated jumper wire between pin 6 and pin 2 the led would come on. I also discovered that it wouldn't work if my feet weren't touching the ground. This is very interesting but completely useless except for some kind of security device and it doesn't get me any closer to a flashing led.
The only thing that I can think of that may have gone wrong is that all the capacitors that I have I desoldered off of old circuit boards. the 555 is new so should still be working. I am getting really frustrated at this circuit and have been tempted to throw the whole thing out of the window.
if there are any questions about how I set something up please ask.
please help
I have also tryed to set it up as shown on some videos on Youtube and had an equal amount of success.
One really strange thing happened while I had it set up as I described first (not the one from youtube). Once I left the power on to the circuit while I changed capacitors and as I was putting the new capacitor in (before I had made contact and wasn't touching anything) the led came on!!! After some experimenting I figured out that if I left everything normal except for no capacitor and then moved my finger close to but not touching the insulated jumper wire between pin 6 and pin 2 the led would come on. I also discovered that it wouldn't work if my feet weren't touching the ground. This is very interesting but completely useless except for some kind of security device and it doesn't get me any closer to a flashing led.
The only thing that I can think of that may have gone wrong is that all the capacitors that I have I desoldered off of old circuit boards. the 555 is new so should still be working. I am getting really frustrated at this circuit and have been tempted to throw the whole thing out of the window.
if there are any questions about how I set something up please ask.
please help