Use this circuit...

 

Hello all! Let me first state that I am a noob to all this electrical stuff and I'm here just to learn and have fun with it, so please forgive my ignorance.

With that begin said, I decided to build the circuit that Bill designed and I don't know if my 555 timer is working correctly or anything for that matter. My led cycles on then off every ~2 min 40 sec (on ~1min 20 off ~ 1min 20). Is this correct? What exactly is the frequency of circuit? What is that measuring?

I have an old AC-DC power converter (power supply) that I was using to power this circuit, 12v @ 0.5amp. Is that enough power for this circuit?

Sorry for all the noob questions, but any help with this would be greatly appreciated.

 

OK, this circuit was custom designed to be off for 8 hours and on for only 45 seconds. It is basically an oscillator.

Is this what you want?

Just a quick comment, you have hijacked this thread. A thread belongs to the person who starts it. If you want to continue a thread then net etiquette is to start a new one then refer back to the thread in question (http://forum.allaboutcircuits.com/showthread.php?t=33015). I suspect a moderator will be along and separate yours from his, so as a point of reference I'll post both schematics.

This is a test circuit. It will work, but it won't be very accurate. The other gentleman was also new to electronics, most of my advice applies to you that I gave him, notably about protoboards. Do you know what a protoboard is?

I would place this circuit more for intermediate users. It is not a good one for beginners, but I'll help as best I can if you want to build it.

Have you seen these articles? They show examples how to use protoboards.

The 555 Projects

Bill's Index

This is the other schematic.

It is considerably more accurate, and harder to build. The crystal oscillator is sensitive, it can't be protoboarded (I think). Again, the comments to the original OP apply.

 

I apologize for “high jacking” this thread; however, I felt that there could be some value added for all by answering some of the questions that I posted on my original response.

I am familiar with a protoboard and as stated in my original message, I have already built the circuit, but I’m not sure if it is correct.

As to follow the forum guidelines and “net etiquette”, I’ll start a new thread.

http://forum.allaboutcircuits.com/showthread.php?p=232887#post232887

 

Someone liked one of the old posts, so I have fixed some of the image problems caused by changes in the forum software.