Practically Classics Forum

Has anybody used a car alternator/dynamo used as the generator in a wind turbine?
I was thinking how much the official or specifically manufactured ones cost a lot.
And as ever true petrol head or greese monkey keeps spares starters and alternators,
why not use one of them to make a wind turbine to charge the batteries.
Just a thought and curious, as the electric bill keeps going up!

You'd struggle to spin a generator quickly enough to start it charging under wind power alone but an alternator, on the other hand, perhaps geared up with the tiniest pulley you could find on the device itself and a big one driving that from a belt, that could work.

I have an old, battery-sensing ACR 15 that would be ideal, may even give the idea a shot and see whether it could keep up with the halogens in my bathroom. That would save me roughly £3.47 per year in electricity charges on the daytime tariff.

Hmm, the cable, the steel from which to make the pulleys required to gear the thing up, the wood for suitable blades and my time - especially that - would come to far more than the £3.47 even before I'd figured out how to attach a ruddy great propeller-like thing to the top of one of the clothes poles in my garden. But, if you want that old alternator and can get to Wednesday night's Metro Centre meet (on the tenth), you're welcome to have it for your own experiment.

I was thinking of it for charging up the batteries at the field where mother keeps her horse.
As it was comical the last time I watcher her take the batteries from the field to the car,
it was muddy and she ended on her arse!
The batteries are used on an electric fence to stop the horses eating and muddying up all
the field in one go. And yes I said horses plural as mother has her horse in a field with
other friends horses.

I wouldn't bother-for about £10- £15 you can get a solar panel trickle charger which would save all the effort. Of course someone might pinch it but then if the batteries have't been nicked so far it'll probably be safe.

A typical alternator needs to run at 5000 rpm to produce its full output. I don't know what speed a typical wind turbine rotor can achieve, but I'd guess about 100 -200 rpm, so you'd need a pretty hefty step-up gearing and you might struggle to overcome the inertia and accelerate that lot from a standstill to operating speed. Commercial wind generators are wound as much lower speed devices. A photo-voltaic array would be a lot simpler if you only need a small output.

Here's a silly idea that's slightly related.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-08-25/m ... ck/2854598

Don't even start me on that abortion of a BINI with a few Moke bits tacked on it's strapped to....

Cheers,

I'm trying to think of a less efficient way of generating electricity. putting a big fan on the roof of your car has to be about the daftest one i have heard of for a while!

Just seen this topic....

My late Uncle did exactly this (Alternator with a fan on, up a pole) in the early 90's.

I remember him showing me it was producing a charge via an Amp Meter, but I also remember him taking the contraption down off the garage roof not long after that - reason unknown I'm afraid.

Allan Lear plans to pedal from the Sunshine Coast to Birdsville over the next seven days to raise environmental awareness and money for charity.

But his legs will not be doing all the work – the 45-year-old will get a boost from a specially designed electric bicycle.

................so the lazy couch potato isn't pedalling at all!!!

I quite like that mokey thing, it's a modern interpretation and probably three times as heavy as a real one but I like it all the same

Only three times as heavy? Can't see that cutting some bits off would lighten a Bini by that much. It looks as though it would make a good hovercraft.