Treadmill motors

Hey Gunner, you can do HEAPS with them - get nicely sidetracked for YEARS if you choose. You have it well over most alternative power people as you have engineering experience and can fabricate the necessary mechanical bits, which are always the stumbling block. Its possible to get REAL energy out of the things with modest effort and not going over the top - certainly enuff to keep a big 12 deep cycle battery charged for emergency lighting and SOME power with an inverter.

Dont have things bookmarked on this PC so canna give you links - will dig them out in the next day or two - but you can Google as well as I..... the electronics is relatively easy to do....

Beware - another obsession coming up......

That's exactly what I plan on doing with the pallet load I picked up....(free)! they all work just fine; not sure why they were tossed out? Oh well, my gain.

Mike

Sounds like another fun project in the works!!

Gunner

"A prudent man foresees the difficulties ahead and prepares for them; the simpleton goes blindly on and suffers the consequences."

- Proverbs 22:3

I got mine in a rather interesting way...

A buddy called, said the dude living in the house behind him was moving out..and had this huge pile of boxes with treadmill motors. Evidently he owned a treadmill company, and they were too big a pain in the ass to move, so would my buddy like to clean them out of his garage? He was moving back to Hong Kong or some such and....My buddy said there were about 9 or so, I could put them in my truck. On arrival..the stack was about 6'x6'...took getting my trailer to get them home....

About half of them have flywheels with Hall Effect sensors attached...

Star-Tracker variable speed DC motors...3600 rpm, 110vt DC 2.5 hp.

Gunner

"A prudent man foresees the difficulties ahead and prepares for them; the simpleton goes blindly on and suffers the consequences."

- Proverbs 22:3

NICE catch! Do they have 1/2-13 Left hand threaded shafts like every other one I've seen? I bought grade 5 nuts from Mcmaster to go with mine. Had to buy more than I need...

No electric power scheme involving battery storage can possibly beat utility prices. The cost of the most economical battery still greatly exceeds the value of the cumulative power it can store and deliver during its lifetime.

I could *give* you electric power for free, on condition you have to store it in a battery first, and it would still cost you far more than your utility charges you.

So there is no "real" energy available this way.

Nope, it wont be cheaper. So? - whats your point? - stick to defending dodgy trailer hitches with big words.....

Andrew VK3BFA,

Your assertion of "real" is wrong. The real thing comes out of your AC outlets. A windmill might be a fun toy, but it is a net loss, a consumption, not productive. You can't beat a megawatt scale economy susidized by government monopoly.

Sort of like ham radio, The performance is worthless, more so since the Internet, but some people are entertained by it.

I (more properly said, my dad and I) made a little water generator when I was a kid, out of a DC motor. It was powered by water falling from a faucet. While the the project was certainly unprofitable, it was educational to me. If the person contemplating this has kids and the project is more educational to kids rather than distracting from fathering, it is a good thing.

i

On Mon, 20 Feb 2006 22:23:48 -0600, with neither quill nor qualm, Richard J Kinch quickly quoth:

OK, YOU tell your utility company that they should pay to put lines up to your cabin which is 5 (or 800) miles from the nearest of their power lines. Your windmill or water wheel generator would be a whole lot cheaper for you than the price they quote to do it, even if their price is a low, subsidised $5k or $10k per mile.

You're economics are correct, but you're a bit narrow minded.

How about selling power back to the grid? You don't need batteries, and it could be a fun project. Granted, you're not going to get rich. In fact, you may not break even (especially if you count your time). I would guess that most people on this group do a lot of projects that could have been done more economically in a more traditional manner, but that's not really the point is it?

Sure, as entertainment or experimentation it is great fun.

Cost effective, no, not in a free world, only when politics turns physics upside down.

'Real" electricity - thats an interesting concept. Wasnt aware there was "imaginary" electricity.

Gunner is probably going to do this with recyled parts. net cost will be minimal. Except for labour, but then we will discount that from this argument (else, why would a Phd spend his time making something that could be bought for a fraction of the cost?)

And he will be able to generate enough "not real" electricity to at least keep an emergency lantern battery charged for power outages. He can then ponder why the "real" electricity is not available, and do an analysis of the "cost" of his "unreal" electricity. In the light from his lantern.

And yes, I will concede ham radio is useless in "economic rationalist" terms. And I am sure that for those people whose only comms link in emergency situations is ham radio will agree with you and would much prefer to wait for "market forces" to come to their aid.

Richard, loosen up a bit - do some mad, off the wall project for the sheer joy of it. You sound like an accountant - someone who knows the price of everything but the value of nothing.

Andrew VK3BFA.

Sounds like you have not seen my Web pages. I'm usually criticized for being too off-the-wall and mad.

And I've owned my tons, literally, of lead-acid batteries over the years.

If self-reliance is the goal, then I would suggest an oil lamp for emergency lighting. Lot less cost and effort.

I live in SE Florida, and have taken 4 direct hits from hurricanes in the last 2 years, so I know a few things about backup power.

If degrading yourself to a primitive life is your goal, windmills are a very effective technology.

And, of course, an oil-fired or gas-fired absorption cycle refrigerator......Danfoss makes some nice gas-fired reefers. Pricey, unless you know someone who runs an RV boneyard. (I don't, but Gunner probably does.)

Megawatts of power are generated by wind both in Holland near the Zuider Zee, and in SW Minnesota.

You might argue that wind power is more "primitive" than fossil or nuke-powered steam turbines, but ever-improving power semiconductor technology is playing and will continue to play an important role in the development of economically-effective, clean, sustainable electric power generation from wind. The semiconductors come into play because, while a steam turbine can be controlled to run at a given speed, wind is variable. Controls make it possible to maximize the output from a windmill under existing wind conditions.