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Hamster-Powered Night Light
An anonymous reader writes "Though Skippy the Hamster powers this night light by running on his excercise wheel, the same concepts and low-rpm alternator design could be applied to a school science project using different energy sources! A small wind or hydro turbine could easily power this alternator. The Otherpower.com staff thought of building a hamster-powered nightlight a couple years ago at a rather, uh, soused company Christmas party. Then recently Analise, an 8th grader from Albuquerque, NM, contacted DanF through the AllExperts.com Science For Kids forum, asking 'Can a rodent generate enough electricity to power a light by running on it's wheel?'"
I heard a theory once about getting a gym to power their lights from the people in the gym. The idea was to hook up all the bikes to a generator. I think its a good idea.
...about as good an idea as teens4christ. Still, it's a neat way to teach kids about dynamos and the like, I'll grant them that! Anything that gets kids interested in science can only be a good thing.
One could also argue that getting kids interested in Jesus Christ can only be a better thing.
I did something similar for a wind generator for a futuristic class (in 1977, no less). One of the designs had an inner and an outer counter-rotating blades which later struck me as too complex. But I was thinking that a design with the magnets at the outer edges made a lot of sense.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
This makes me wonder how much a human would produce in a big wheel or several humans in a long wheel.
A moderately-trained human being can generate about 100 watts for several hours (in addition to the other 100 watts needed for the body to live). Top long-distance athletes (cycling, running) can go up to around 400 watts, but only for a limited amount of time (less than 1 hour). Peak power is of course higher (1 KW for a few seconds?).
So I'm curious. I run/jog a bit, and if I use the gym they have machines that waste electricity just to make me run on the spot.
If we were to get a human-sized hamster wheel, how much energy could I *generate* on it doing a, say, 30 min hard run every morning?
If everyone did this, would it have an impact on our electricity usage in the homes - and provide an incentive for overweight people to jog (not only lose weight, but save money on electricity bills). Not only this, but it's good to jog on a surface which has your footfall a little higher than the point your foot leaves the ground (as a wheel would) because it lessens impact fatigue on your ankles and particularly knees.
I used to have a 1.5V analogue quartz wall clock that was powered by a Crystal Set. With a 10m antenna, I could pull in enough power to run the thing 24/7.
Other things, such as LEDs and small motors, used to get hooked up to the set too.
I also found a 1930s radio speaker in a junk shop - it was in a walnut case and included a multi-tapped transformer to give the speaker numerous effective impedances from 3.4 Ohms all the way up to 2K Ohms. Set on 2K Ohms, the crystal set was easily as loud as a small battery-powered AM radio.
AT&ROFLMAO
a Untrained human can produce easily 25-40 watts for several hours on a recumbent pedal generator. we did this last Field day. 5 Ham radio operators (usually fat guys) on home made recumbent pedal generators made enough electricity by leisurely pedaling to power all the radios used for around the world contacts for that 24 hours. some of the radios had a 100Watt power output and there certianly were more than 4 radios working at a time.
the key is power -> battery bank -> devices. when the radios are recieving they draw very little so the power you generate is stored for that high power intermittent draw.
none of us were atheletes in any way shape or form, and it was not difficult for any of us to do a 2 hour stint on the generators because of thwe recumbent design.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
True enough, pressure plates that push downwards and generate power (I.e. people walk across them)? Just some thoughts.
I was at the Glastonbury Festival this summer, one of the UK's biggest summer festivals which gets crammed with 150,000 hippies every year.
In one of the tents, a exercise bike was rigged up to a sound system (I assume with a resevoir to hold the power gained.) The idea being that the dance tent could be self sustained, green and economical enough to provide it's own electricity for the music, lights and bar equipment.
It worked! However not many people want to beast themselves on a bike/treadmill for 45 mins to listen to music and have a nice pint of beer.
Quite unique for the Glastonbury festival anyway I thought!
Mmmmmmm beer.
Ball park figure, if you're in really good shape and put a serious workout into it you may be able to run a bicycle-generator at 150 watts for a half hour.
That's 0.075 kilowatt-hours of power from your half-hour workout. Probably less than one cent worth of electricity (depending on your local electric prices).
Even if you had an entire gym full of people running them continuously the value of electricity produced is neglegible, and the extra hardware and maintanence costs to add generators and wiring to the equipment makes it a losing proposition.
You'd be better off digging ditches at minimum wage and using the money to buy solar cells or a wind turbine or to simply pay someone to pump oil out of the ground and burn it.
On the other hand, I guess a gym could set it up as a motivational gimmick. Running the lights and what-not off of "excercise power" would actually be more expensive, but maybe you can draw and hold costomers with the gimmick. Having the exercise machines display watts of power and total watt-hours for the session might give customers more focus and goals in their workout. And they get to feel they are being enviornmentally "green", chuckle.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
That idea seems to be fading.
"The legitimate powers of government extend only to such acts as are injurious to others." Thomas Jefferson.
Ever see that old George Carlin routine about how god has been one of the leading killers of man throughout the ages?
Yes the great philosopher George Carlin. George "they _only_ killed 3000 people on 9/11 - what's the big deal?" Carlin. I don't know if there's a man more full of himself.
That argument is tired and old. Those people were not killed by God or religion, they were killed by people taking advantage of the beliefs of others for their own corrupt political/selfish/disgusting gains.
I don't see most religions having those problems anymore (with one notable exception - hopefully that religion will get it figured out over the next decade or two).
I've just signed legislation that'll outlaw Russia forever. We'll begin bombing in five minutes.
A world-class bike sprinter can generate 1.9 KW (almost 3 horsepower!) for a few seconds.
Some time ago I got a flat tire, and was constantly blown back by the windforce of passing trucks. The thought occurred to me, that all that energy goes to waste despite being very predictable and fairly ubiquitous accross our country. I'd like to see someone invent a very disposable, mass-producable, cheap windmill, maybe as big as a pinwheel, that we can use to cover the center medians of our highways and possibly power at LEAST all the traffic lights.
This article looks like the efficiencies are increasing.. now to make it fractions of a penny to produce.
-g