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Hand-Powered Hardware?
quiddity writes "Following the Goofy USB Devices post, one has to know what can be self-powered when the batteries all die. You can handcrank your Gameboy, recharge your cellphone or pda (even grandpa), wind up a webserver (with minions, a beowulf..), see in the dark, and project a movie. What else can we propel through the next blackout/apocalypse?" Some of these devices have have been on Slashdot before; what cool hand-powered tech hasn't been and should be?
So that's what they're calling it these days...........
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
Not an academic question -- we lost power for 5 days last December and again for 4 days last January.
If all this should have a reason, we would be the last to know.
Say a Mini-ITX low power, embedded OS on flash with a broswer & email. Modem and Ether net. TV output for my battery powered TV.
Yeah, I use Beowulf to power my server.
...
Every day, I toss in the pallets of discarded Beowulf pallets from geeks who though it told you how to build a redundant array of inexpensive computers (RAIC).
I remember reading about a device developed specifically to assist third-world countries with their crop planting and communications via a radio that is hand-cranked and provides a large amount of listening time per crank.
:).
Apparently these countries suffer from a lack of information about weather patterns, which would greatly assist with the crop planting, and which is provided by the hand-cranked radio
An example of geeky inventing that actually has practial application, rare on slashdot
Post apocalyptic gaming goodness
Even if we have some cool hand-powered hardware, how are we going to use it properly?
Maybe a power-generating keyboard and mouse, so the faster you type and move your mouse, the longer your hand-powered PC will stay on.
Freeplay are a company that specialise in wind-up electronic toys including a mobile phone charger.
I have this radio, designed by Freeplay that has a wind-up charger and solar panel. Works on FM, MW, SW and LW with a 30 station memory. Its not bad, works well and with good sound quality. It also doesn't look dorky like some of their earlier models.
Unknown host pong.
Sell energy back to your local utility!
Quid festinatio swallonis est aetherfuga inonusti?
Africus aut Europaeus?
This is nice and all but I would much rather see a device (like your cellphone, pda, or gameboy) take advantage of the piezoelectric effect so the batteries charge when you use the device.
A well-trained human body can produce around 100 W of motion effect for a couple of hours. (bicycle style)
...without display.
So don't even think p4 ok?
maybe an via mini-itx or something
Warning: This sig contains a small bug. ==> *
I think it would be really cool if someone would invent a two wheeled electric scooter, with a seat, and add pedals, so you could charge the battery. That way, instead of constantly going home to recharge, you could just hop on, turn the pedals, and ride it all day...
--- Generation X: The first generation to have SIG lines inferior to their parents... ---
For a physics assignment last year a friend and I created a hand-cranked generator using an old windshield wiper motor. It worked pretty well: we were able to power a boom box, a Game Boy Advance, a small water pump, a large light, and a few other items.
We were thinking of selling it on the street during the blackout last summer, but decided that its nostalgic value would end up outweighing any monetary compensation we would gain.
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Hello, Slashdot user. My name is Dr. Sbaitso. I am here to help you.
How about pedal-powered aircraft as the ultimate human-powered tech-toy?
One problem is the low power budget for human-powered systems. The average fit adult can only crank out about 75 W. (No specs on the power output of the average computer user). Even a athletic cyclist only puts out about 200W.
A cyclist should be able to power a laptop, but running much more than that would be difficult.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
Why hand power it when you can get mice to do it for you
Mouse powered Chips, Open source Processors and Lego
when playing Gameboys and other such devices, isn't it possible just to harness all the extra energy expended beyond that which is required to tell the device, "Yes, move up, and then left, and then..."? Don't mod this up to funny: I'm serious. Think of all the energy that is wasted by just heating the plastic, when it could go into powering the device in the first place.
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Doesn't that make five?
1 + 3 + 1 ?
*has a flash back to the movie Clue. "1 + 2 + 1 + 1"*
If you can figure out a way to convert such a paltry amount of heat into useable electricity, tell me, and we'll both be billionaires.
-Reid
so the post is about human powered tech, not alternate power tech. they're already being looked at for militay boots ,but i'd like to see the piezio electric shoes/boots for use with an integrated system of things like woven heaters in pants/coat/shoe liners, entertainment/communications. a powered antennae woven into the back of a jacket would be a leap on signal strength and have the added bonus of being shielded, most use handsfree anyway so just plug into the clothes. granted, it is a specialized and initially costly set of applications but over time (assuming there's a technology rich future available to us given current events and lessons of history, but i digress) we could see such things as being more easily available.
Got to love the glow-in-the-dark telco-powered vibrator for "sore muscles". Guess some chicks can't even make it through a power outage!
Love the anecdote though...
"Last time I was in LA, I had to walk down eight flights of stairs with two big bags to check out of the hotel that had been without power twice during my stay. The vibrator would have really helped my muscles after that stressful hotel stay!"
There's muscles down there, but c'mon, they weren't worked hard from carrying bags.
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That radio was distributed in war zones and refugee camps.
By the way that's a great article on subject, i.e. personally powered devices
Wow, it uses Faraday's Principle of Induction to generate electricity? What a novel way of doing it!
Sorry, I couldn't help but make fun of you for stating it like it's something interesting or uncommon. Virtually ALL of the world's energy comes from changing kinetic energy into electricity using a dynamo or generator -- which use, you guessed it, Faraday's principle of induction. There are a few exceptions, such as photovoltaic cells and thermocouples, but those are absolutely marginal at best. Grid-scale solar power doesn't use photovoltaic cells, but typically heats water into steam to turn turbines. Thermocouples have never been widely deployed.
Random and weird software I've written.
Dutch designer Dick van Hoff recently designed beautiful hand-powered kitchen utensils. To quote:
Dick van Hoff's Tyranny of the Plug series of kitchen machines chop, churn and blend, but don't require electricity. They are powered by human energy-- by pulling on them, turning them or moving them to and fro... and they function beautifully.
Pictures on Designboom and Slowlab.Van Hoff is calling into question the fact that members of contemporary society readily accept new objects that are powered by electricity, yet rarely contemplate where the power is coming from. Instead, his products make people invest their human energy into powering them.
Sleekly yet simply designed of cast iron, chrome, glass, and wood, these machines run smoothly and with efficiency, while fostering awareness and contemplation.