Cheap Windmill motor ?

Any old permanent magnet DC motor, like those in a toy or an autombile fan or windscreen wiper (take out the worm&wheel gearing) will work as a gererator when spun.

Thanks.. good idea! I was just "hoping" that I could come up with a way to make it easy for people in disaster areas to generate a few hundred watts to run their tv's or other small wattage devices in emergency situations. (yeah.. you'd see the ceiling fan nailed to the tops of their houses lol) but hey if it can be made to work ..why not? THanks again.

I have been working on similar ideas (concept only) for the same reason (disaster relief).

One notion was obtaining a surplus magneto as in a hand crank comm station (military) and gearing it such that a wind or tidal or pedal power could maintain some power distribution or storage

charles

I like your signature.. yes who are we to say that? Hell, there could be a ghost following all us around all day and we'd never know would we?

Anyway.. the ceiling or typical window fan is attractive because in a disaster situation it could most easily be used by a consumer who is "under the weather" hot, miserable, not inclined to want to do too much innovation in the misery of the time; the fan blades are already attached, and IF it worked (or could be easily modified to work) one would only have to set on the roof in the breeze to get some small 100 or so watts?

Any ideas?.. one problem with using generators is they would have to be geared up to get the revolutions needed woudn't they .. also the person has to weld or attach somehow some fabricated fan blades. etc.. lota work when your kids are hungry and hot..

IF a cheap mod could be found that worked well enough.. it could be a good seller for hurricane/disaster kits and even to find a use for those cast offs that still work (send em to poor areas of the world to provide a little juice where needed. ! ) .

Del's charger will work nicely. About 55 years ago I had a pump action flash light,

It was a permanent magnet motor with a mechanism similar to an (old) bicycle bell.

You really had to pump the thing tom have light.

With modern technology a better more effective charger can be built.

I bought a generating flashlight.

A coil about 1" x 5/8" to 1" diam. placed in the centre of a 3.5 to 4" stroke plastic tube. with a 1" x 1/2" permanent magnet capable of sliding trough the coil. with rechargeable batteries and diodes. enough power can be generated to power a led for hours.

I think you may encounter a problem regarding the strength of the fan. A few years ago I worked for a company installing small domestic wind turbines. Even the tiny ones which produce about 500w are built much more substantialy than a ceiling fan. I can't remember what speed they go at but let me tell you they go like the clappers. If you got your ceiling fan to the same speed then I think the blades would fly off.

Yes you can but you really don't want to do that because:

1) it is AC and the you will have to redo the wiring somewhat by adding a capacitor. 2) The output will be eratic and hard to control.

A better way would be to use a car altenator with a built in voltage regulator. New they are about $100. You can store the power in car batteries and use an inverter to convert it to standard 110V AC.

If there is room for it, I suggest a Savonius(?) rotor. Take a 55-gal drum (or other size) and cut it in half lengthwise. Weld it back together in an "S" shape and mount it on a verticle shaft. It will not be as efficient as a blade type rotor, but doesn't need to be oriented to the wind and is cheap.

I agree about the automotive alternator + batteries + inverter.