Home Made Electricity

why not?

a megnetic and a core of windings then turn it.

You must first check for any limitations and the decide what is practical.

Sources to consider includes chemical, Sun, Heat, wind, water, fuel.

Rub your feet on the carpet and touch a doorknob. You could plug something into a receptacle although, technically you would not be the producer in the fullest sense of the word, but you would be at home, and you would be able to produce electricity!

Your question is rather ambiguous and leaves the answer you seek open to multi-faceted interpretation.

Before you can get a useful answer, think: Do you need electricity at home for a flashlight? A radio transmitter? A alternative home power supply? Electrolysis? Shock therapy? A Frankenstein experiment?

What?

rig an alternator or generator to a bicycle frame.

Can we use this system to charge a battery bank that may be use to power-up dc lighting or even a dc appliance? Like do an exercise in a stationary bicycle, and if so then, it's another way to create electrical power for our homes.

Preferrably on a Tandem Bicycle-wheels touching not the floor- and Pedal Vigourously-you and your good lady- taking turns.

How long can you pump equal to 1 Horse Power = 746 watts ?

I am into developing and using alternative energy needs for home requirement.I live in mysore and it would be good idea to get in touch by email with me.

ckusbd@gmail.com

Yes , ever thing is possible this live , in saudi , we produce electricity through our car , we left the car and remove the back tirs and connect it to Generator , start the Car let it run , you will get power at home up to 10000kw

Electric production at home is not only possible, but, in some areas if you are doing so and produce an excess you can sell it to the local power grid. As of the last listing I read this could be done in 41 states. See www.dsireuse.org for information on net meetering.

Wind generation, water generation, solar, thermal, are all sources of power that can be harnessed. You can also have a small steam generation system if you have a source of burnable substance. This can range from biomass to a coal seam in the back yard.

Most people find that it is beyond their desire to generate their own electricity unless they are beyond the reach of the local power grid.

For Wind check out www.skystreamenergy.com www.windenergy.com also article about wind usage at www.MotherEarthNews.com showing wind class maps of the U.S.

for net metering www.dsireuse.org

For Solar Check out www.homepower.com for what is producable in your area www.pvwatts.org www.earthsolar.com www.backwoodssolar.com www.sierracolar.com

If you have a stream of water moving down hill then I would suggest looking into a water turbine or water wheel unit to generate electric. Most of these systems generate D.C. and you will need to use an inverter to change it to a.c. current.

Any of the other methods require that you have constant monitoring or large scale operation to run unless you are over a source of geothermal mass (valcano or very hot spring) and can run a hot pipe into the area to extract the thermo energy and apply it to a generation system. Turbine or recip engine turning a generator.

Additionally if you are on a large body of water that has good steady wave action you can generate electricity from the wave action using several motion capturing methods.

Hi RicinCinci,

"Most people find that it is beyond their desire to generate their own electricity unless they are beyond the reach of the local power grid. "

How about lots, and lots, of people that would be happy creating electicity! What I'm think is "spinning" at all these health clubs. Take L.A. Fitness, for example. I don't know how many stationary bikes they have in each club but lets assume they have 50 or so. Those bikes run almost continuously! Instead of friction, or whatever, type of resistance they use (which is just wasted energy) lets come up with generators that can be retrofitted to them. The user would be happy and the power produced can be sold back to the electrical utility. Everyone wins!

Cheers

This is the info the poster of "Belly" needed.

His belly could worth its weight in gold.

JohnJohn

Your idea of using the stationary bikes to generate electricity is not new. In a back issue of Popular Mechanics they suggested that for electric in the bomb shelter in the back yard a few hours of peddling a bike with a generator instead of rear wheel would produce electric to charge the batteries for the air circulator fan and lights. Guess it was something that never had to be tried.

Now I would suggest using an alternator and flywheel arrangement. Could change those extra pounds into watts of power.

Ric

I'm not surprised that it's been suggested before. But just look at the volume (pun intended). Tons and tons of lard being converted into power for the masses. Quite a chemical reaction.

Anyway, just a passing thought...

Lemons, Potatos or a jug of salt water with a copper electrode and a magnesium electrode! you get about 1,5volts of of that, enough for a little radio! Never tried it, saw it on the telly the other night!

Trevor Baylis invented the clockwork radio. The device is widely known throughout the African countries.

I've asked myself the same question. I have a small creek that runs through my back yard. There is about 10' of fall from one end to the other. I've often thought of installing a couple of alternators from a car to a paddle wheel and charging batteries. Then from the batteries install an inverter.

Good thinking!! Do some homework on the rpm and the water force to work the

paddle otherwise you may not get much usable power. the design of the paddle is quite important. Keep us informed when you begun the work.

chandu

Check out the water turbines that run on very little water. I remember a thread here that was about water turbines and alternate power. Will try to come up with the link for you. Try WWW.absak.com they are a supplier and there are many others that manufacture the small turbine coupled to an alternator for both A.C. and Rectified D.C. applications

Ric

I hope RicinCinci did some value addition in the discussion.

bndas kolkata india

Hi jrpeck,

Check out this thread. There are some good ideas and some very good links.

Regards,

-John

I like the idea of combinations of conventional technology in unconventional ways, and using stuff that is usually wasted. Wind, water, steam (running from ones heating system), and solar. Car alternators could be a good start, they could run from the car of course. I guess they must be good for somewhere around one or two HP (775 watts each Horse Power?) and could be coupled to wind power, water power or perhaps a small steam engine coupled to the heating system of the house. Several different alternators powered from the different sources could be used to charge car batteries, along with several solar panels. The batteries could be used to power several 5000 watt UPS, such as some of the larger ones they used to sell for computers or the ones they use for mobile homes.

I also like the idea of collecting heat from the sun in a solar furnace. A Parabolic mirror about one meter in diameter can produce more than 2,000 watts of heat, during sunny days, and using it to boil water for the steam engine. Perhaps an old air compressor could be converted to a steam engine, Of course, one of the old all metal compressors with a high pressure rating and pressure regulation.

Even 5,000 watts used to be enough to power ones home modestly. I remember when houses used to have 50 amp service as a standard which is about 6000 watts.

Especially if one comes up with more efficient systems for refridgeration, or ironing clothes and toasting bread, or airconditioning. For those of you in India, we Americans use electric irons (2000 watts), toasters (1,500 to 2,000 watts), and air conditioners 1,000-5,000 watts, also refridgerators at least 200 watts and they tend to run about half the time.

Geoffrey Reed

Hello. I'm new to this forum.

I live in a place where there is an unlimited amount of forestry waste to be had. I have recently become interested in two things; the coming age of the electric car and the wood gas generators that powered so many vehicles in Europe during WWII.

Although I believe the electric car will be a wonderful thing (let the utility company change oil!) I have no illusions about how much it will cost on my utility bill to recharge my car daily and about the great demand placed on the utility company; possibly creating skyrocketing electric bills.

Soooo...here's my idea. A V-8 or 6 cylinder gasoline engine coupled to a 10-20 KW generator (maybe less KW? I dunno...) and fed wood gas produced in, of course, a home built wood gas generator. Of course, due to the low efficiency of the internal combustion engine, it will be necessary to run the exhaust system through a heat exchanger to heat domestic water to take full advantage of the BTU value of the wood gas. The cooling system should also, in winter, be run through a heat exchanger in the house and thus heat the house with waste heat. In summer, perhaps a large insulated water storage tank?

The system will only work if I am able to sell surplus current back to the utility company; thus storing electricity as money in the bank rather than as current in batteries. What hardware (software?) is required to allow me to match the 60 cycle sine wave of the utility company? What is required to be installed to guarantee I will not be able to generate onto the grid when the grid is down?