Secondary of a transformer as a choke?

[Andypairo]

I came in possess of 4 *12-100VA toroids and I was wondering if the secondary windings could be used as filtering chokes (between the bridges and the caps) or in a PI filter.

I guess the answer is no due to saturation of the core.. am I right?

Thanks

Andypairo

 

[Petter]

It will work for very low currents, then you get into saturation and inductance will drop off very fast.

Now, you might be able to do something with the primary -- like perhaps place a coil in series with while attempting to use the secondary as the inductor. Thus you will get an inductance which looks like a much larger value than the one you are putting in there + you get some reactance from the transformer.

If it is not a toroid you might be able to pull the thing apart and create a small air-gap. Then you might even be able to use the primary as inductor, or even wire the two in series.

Petter

 

[Andypairo]

A inductance on the primary side prevents core from saturating?
Or do you think is better (two of these have broken promary) to unwind the secondary and use the wire for making a inductor?

Cheers

Andypairo