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Self-powered computer
- Thread starter Janglur
- Start date
- Joined
- Jan 20, 2006
Shelnutt2 said:
if you could find that article, I would love to read it. When you run electrolsis like that, you should be able to (under ideal environments, ie no energy loss) return 100% of the inputted energy. Practically though, you are unlikely to come near to 100%.
If you can find that article though, I really would love to read it. Entertainment.
- Joined
- Dec 13, 2005
- Location
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please do share. I always like to read about something that defys the laws of physics.
Couldn't he just use Bio Fuel (animal/food waste). Just needs somewhere to store it - far, far away, a heater which he could (almost) perpetually run off the fuel he creates or store his "fuel" in a warm environment, someway to convert methane etc into electricity and a long extension cable - yeah I know he said he didn't want to plug it in but it's not like it's the national grid or anything.
People have been running farms etc on this fuel for years.
I think the UK buys back any electricity made (lawfully) by the public too.
He could go really "eco" and get a small holding to help run it.
Anyone?
People have been running farms etc on this fuel for years.
I think the UK buys back any electricity made (lawfully) by the public too.
He could go really "eco" and get a small holding to help run it.
Anyone?
- Joined
- Jul 21, 2006
- Location
- CYYZ Pearson
Let me go hardware hunting...
I'll shurely find you a way of powering a somewhat powerful computer forever... but it may be large and minorly expensive.
SYSTEM #1 (expensive, mobile products)
CPU: Turion 64 X2
MOBO: Uhh... Call HP...
RAM: Whatever DDR2 you can find with the lowest voltages.
VIDEO: Radeon mobile, whatever has the best power to processing power ratio.
STORAGE-A: Solid-State... perhaps that OCZ 16Gb usb drive, but you'll need a USB to SATA or mini-IDE converter.
STORAGE-B: Something with some real space, low-power HDD, set to go inactiave when not in use for any more then 1-5 min.
To produce power, a solar array, wind turbine, or a watermill.... with a powerful battery...
OMG, just get a laptop, a backup battery, and a windmill. It's quite simple... minus the windmill part, which is a couple grand.
I'll shurely find you a way of powering a somewhat powerful computer forever... but it may be large and minorly expensive.
SYSTEM #1 (expensive, mobile products)
CPU: Turion 64 X2
MOBO: Uhh... Call HP...
RAM: Whatever DDR2 you can find with the lowest voltages.
VIDEO: Radeon mobile, whatever has the best power to processing power ratio.
STORAGE-A: Solid-State... perhaps that OCZ 16Gb usb drive, but you'll need a USB to SATA or mini-IDE converter.
STORAGE-B: Something with some real space, low-power HDD, set to go inactiave when not in use for any more then 1-5 min.
To produce power, a solar array, wind turbine, or a watermill.... with a powerful battery...
OMG, just get a laptop, a backup battery, and a windmill. It's quite simple... minus the windmill part, which is a couple grand.
- Joined
- Jun 28, 2005
- Location
- Winnipeg Manitoba
Hey shell I like your avitar, Tsukasa from .Hack//sign
Anyway. I say get a cheap laptop. Ive seen 200Mhz Pentum MMxs go for about $25 with no battery. (you wont need it anyway.)
Get some batteries from a high capacity UPS such as the one I have.
Depending on the size of the batteries you choose get 4 - 8 of them.
Or if you can you can get real storage batteries. I have seen them at my local princess auto in 12v versions. The 12v ones are a bit bigger than a computer tower. 2 of those should be all you will ever need. they ran for about $114. Heavy as hell too.
Make sure they are deep cycle.
Run them in serise parallell. (in sets of 2 parallelled to make 24v you need higher voltage for regulation).
Now get an automotive regulator wich is made to regulate down to about 13.8v - 14.5v. Plugging this direclty into the laptops power input should work since the SMPS in the laptop should be able to compensate for the low voltage since they usualy run on a max of 5v. I dont think there are any 12v systems in a laptop, least none I have encountered. The only reason most laptops need 17.8v or more is to charge the battery but you wont be charging it.
Now you have a batery bank so next you need a charging system.
Solar panels are the best bet.
Now most laptops draw between 1.2Amps and 3Amps depending on whats in them and how old they are. I simple current meter on the power supply running a CPU benchmark should give you a good idea of the current rating.
(this will also help you choose the ammount of batteries needed)
Now get some solar panels.
These dont look half bad.
now since wattage is equal to voltage x current this panel will supply about 3-4 amps in full light. 2 of these should be all that you need. Now just connect them to your batteries in serise since the batteries are in serise so you will need to 12v panels to charge 24v battery bank you will need a solar charging controller to prevent overcharging and battery damage. If you use a charging controller most of them have a connection on them to connect the output supply so that after the batteries are fully charged the load, in your case the laptop wont draw power from the batteries and only the panel. Then when the voltage drops below a certain point it will switch the laprop to the batteries.
They should be up to powering the laptop directly and using the left over current to charge the batteries. Durring the night when there is no light the laptop will run off of the battery bank. If you find that the batteries dont get fully charged durring the day add more solar cells. If the batteries die overnight then add more batteries. (in wich case more solare cells might also be needed in order to charge them all).
This should run you about $300 - $600 dollars depending on the setup and parts used. Yes solar equipment is expensive, and so are good batteries and you will need those for all solar setups.
I have also seen people building homade wind turbines out of car alternators. You could add that to your setup too if you wish. The gearbox for the RMP conversion would probably be expensive while the alternator can be bought for like $10 at a scrap yart of $40 new.
Anyway. I say get a cheap laptop. Ive seen 200Mhz Pentum MMxs go for about $25 with no battery. (you wont need it anyway.)
Get some batteries from a high capacity UPS such as the one I have.
Depending on the size of the batteries you choose get 4 - 8 of them.
Or if you can you can get real storage batteries. I have seen them at my local princess auto in 12v versions. The 12v ones are a bit bigger than a computer tower. 2 of those should be all you will ever need. they ran for about $114. Heavy as hell too.
Make sure they are deep cycle.
Run them in serise parallell. (in sets of 2 parallelled to make 24v you need higher voltage for regulation).
Now get an automotive regulator wich is made to regulate down to about 13.8v - 14.5v. Plugging this direclty into the laptops power input should work since the SMPS in the laptop should be able to compensate for the low voltage since they usualy run on a max of 5v. I dont think there are any 12v systems in a laptop, least none I have encountered. The only reason most laptops need 17.8v or more is to charge the battery but you wont be charging it.
Now you have a batery bank so next you need a charging system.
Solar panels are the best bet.
Now most laptops draw between 1.2Amps and 3Amps depending on whats in them and how old they are. I simple current meter on the power supply running a CPU benchmark should give you a good idea of the current rating.
(this will also help you choose the ammount of batteries needed)
Now get some solar panels.
These dont look half bad.
now since wattage is equal to voltage x current this panel will supply about 3-4 amps in full light. 2 of these should be all that you need. Now just connect them to your batteries in serise since the batteries are in serise so you will need to 12v panels to charge 24v battery bank you will need a solar charging controller to prevent overcharging and battery damage. If you use a charging controller most of them have a connection on them to connect the output supply so that after the batteries are fully charged the load, in your case the laptop wont draw power from the batteries and only the panel. Then when the voltage drops below a certain point it will switch the laprop to the batteries.
They should be up to powering the laptop directly and using the left over current to charge the batteries. Durring the night when there is no light the laptop will run off of the battery bank. If you find that the batteries dont get fully charged durring the day add more solar cells. If the batteries die overnight then add more batteries. (in wich case more solare cells might also be needed in order to charge them all).
This should run you about $300 - $600 dollars depending on the setup and parts used. Yes solar equipment is expensive, and so are good batteries and you will need those for all solar setups.
I have also seen people building homade wind turbines out of car alternators. You could add that to your setup too if you wish. The gearbox for the RMP conversion would probably be expensive while the alternator can be bought for like $10 at a scrap yart of $40 new.
http://www.otherpower.com/cgi-bin/webbbs/webbbs_config.pl?noframes;read=16919
Seems I was right/wrong about Bingo Fuel. If you don't count the carbon you have to input then your output is great.
I'm going to be experimenting soon with bingo fuel, so I'll let you guys know.
Seems I was right/wrong about Bingo Fuel. If you don't count the carbon you have to input then your output is great.
I'm going to be experimenting soon with bingo fuel, so I'll let you guys know.
http://www.otherpower.com/cgi-bin/webbbs/webbbs_config.pl?noframes;read=16919
Seems I was right/wrong about Bingo Fuel. If you don't count the carbon you have to input then your output is great.
I'm going to be experimenting soon with bingo fuel, so I'll let you guys know.
http://www.21stcenturyradio.com/futureenergytech-11.24.00.htm
Seems I was right/wrong about Bingo Fuel. If you don't count the carbon you have to input then your output is great.
I'm going to be experimenting soon with bingo fuel, so I'll let you guys know.
http://www.21stcenturyradio.com/futureenergytech-11.24.00.htm
Last edited:
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- Dec 13, 2005
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I have an idea (a bad one, probably give you just enough power to power the "on" LED) basically, make the upper 1/3 of the case air tight, and give it a blow hole. then, dunno how, make a small wind turbine type thing to fit in the blow hole. instant wind power by use of the heat rising and the only place it can go is through the blow hole, which just happens to have a wind generator 
. ok it sucks.
. ok it sucks.
- Joined
- Jan 17, 2003
- Location
- Centennial, Colorado
There was a myth-busters about this. It took them thousands of coils (and many many pounds) of wire to suck up enough power to light a 45W household lightbuilb. And this was when underneath one of those humungous Electrical towers. They also made mention that this method is illegal in many places in the US.Rev said:Do you live near any high tension power lines?
You could put some coils of wire up and mooch off of inductance.
In regards to those solar panels on eBay. Its been a while since Ive had any electrical classes but isn't W=V*A? and if the panels are 18W @3.6 Amps I see only 5 Volts per pannel... or am I missing something? (aside from him saying he got 22.x volts on his voltmeter)
Skeith: most old laptops had the transformer inside the laptop itself, so you might run into problems there unless you are able to bypass that. You will want to do a lot of looking and probing with a voltmeter (and other meters) inside the laptop before oyu just throw a 12v car battery on it.
Splat: lol that was really funny. Can you say 'head crash'?
That bingo fuel thing sounds interesting. However, the wording they use at some points can be slightly misleading. You can't get more energy than what you put in(which we all, or most of us know), the only reason why they say that is they are leaving out the value of one of the fuels in the equation(the carbon rods). In the end it does not sound all that efficient after all.
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- Dec 13, 2005
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^^^also the myth busters did a segment on the intercepting radio waves mentioned earlier in the thread. I think it was that you needed a 150 foot pole to power a clock radio.
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- Jul 21, 2006
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I tried that with the copper wires going down a 3Km stretch of fencing(par'l to 20'000v HT lines)... I only got enough energy to barely light a 1v light bulb, but I bet I could get A LOT more power if the tini-tiny converter I had was working properly, and could pick up power from a much wider frequency range.freakdiablo said:
HOWEVER, A Static energy gathering kite can produce a lethal shock!
If you hade many of those copper-foil deathtraps in the air in a constantly windy place... you could gather a large amount of energy.
S*** that hurt...
It's basically a tin-foil kite reeled up to about 500-1000ft where it gathers naturally occurring static energy, the same source that creates lightning...
It's only like 2 volts, but the ammerage is extremely high... I blew my ammeter trying to get a reading.
To get "free" energy, you must make a large down-payment.
P.S. Lightning is a big problem with gathering energy with a metal kite wired to the ground.
Last edited:
- Joined
- May 27, 2002
- Location
- Ohio
wow, this thread came back to life, and its getting lively once again!
man, i'm having a blast reading some of these posts as well!!!
and on the whole Bingo fuel thing...
WHY DO THEY CALL IT BINGO!?!?, dumb name...but oh well.
yeah, its NOT perpetual motion. as said, it consumes the carbon rods. which lets it emit MORE gas, at a lower voltage. Sure, you may only put in 1 volt, and get 1.44 volts out of it. But thats ONLY measuring the voltage / and current, and not counting the rods as well. the rods end up dumping more energy into the whole equation.
THOUGH, look at how much stuff is made of carbon? basicly, ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING organic. the stuff isn't exactly rare. now getting a 100% carbon rod might not be extremly cheap. But getting rods with large ammounts of carbon in it would probably be pretty cheap.
the next question would be...how much energy does it take us to make a carbon rod? how much work is involved? is it a 100% carbon rod, or a mixture? Once those questions can be answered, and we can get a price roughly figured out, then we will honestly see how viable of an option it is.
i have nothing agenst it either. would be great if Carbon rods ( or mixture rods, with large ammounts of carbon in it ) were cheap, and really easy to make.
so if anyone has any info on carbon rods...please share.
man, i'm having a blast reading some of these posts as well!!!
and on the whole Bingo fuel thing...
WHY DO THEY CALL IT BINGO!?!?, dumb name...but oh well.
yeah, its NOT perpetual motion. as said, it consumes the carbon rods. which lets it emit MORE gas, at a lower voltage. Sure, you may only put in 1 volt, and get 1.44 volts out of it. But thats ONLY measuring the voltage / and current, and not counting the rods as well. the rods end up dumping more energy into the whole equation.
THOUGH, look at how much stuff is made of carbon? basicly, ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING organic. the stuff isn't exactly rare. now getting a 100% carbon rod might not be extremly cheap. But getting rods with large ammounts of carbon in it would probably be pretty cheap.
the next question would be...how much energy does it take us to make a carbon rod? how much work is involved? is it a 100% carbon rod, or a mixture? Once those questions can be answered, and we can get a price roughly figured out, then we will honestly see how viable of an option it is.
i have nothing agenst it either. would be great if Carbon rods ( or mixture rods, with large ammounts of carbon in it ) were cheap, and really easy to make.
so if anyone has any info on carbon rods...please share.
zexmarquies01,
I was thinking about experimenting with Coal/charcoal. They both have very high carbon rates and are cheaper. Only reason I haven't already tried them are I don't have an arc welder or anything else that will give me the amps/volts needed....yet.
I was thinking about experimenting with Coal/charcoal. They both have very high carbon rates and are cheaper. Only reason I haven't already tried them are I don't have an arc welder or anything else that will give me the amps/volts needed....yet.
- Joined
- Dec 13, 2005
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well, another idea, bad one, but another one. This one actually doubles as a cooling solution. Use a flammable liquidated gas (methane or something) and use it the same way liquid nitrogen is used. long insulated pipe, cpu at 1 end. only, put a turbine at the top end. liquid heats up, turns to gas spins turbine. instant power. have some tubing run the gas to a small modified generator, even more power. ofcourse, this would be ineffective as you would have to keep adding the gas to keep it on and cool, which kind of takes area from the fact that you probably want it on constantly and not have critical parts melting.
- Joined
- Dec 8, 2004
Splat,
You are a funny mofo. I enjoyed reading this thread for the pure entertainment value of some of the ideas.
Basically, if there was a way to have a cheap laptop that ran off of free/near free energy, don`t you think it would be out in the market today? Or maybe even the near future? Of course it would probably be expensive as the ECO cars that are out there today.
By the way, the guy who started this thread is banned. But I will keep reading for fun.
You are a funny mofo. I enjoyed reading this thread for the pure entertainment value of some of the ideas.
Basically, if there was a way to have a cheap laptop that ran off of free/near free energy, don`t you think it would be out in the market today? Or maybe even the near future? Of course it would probably be expensive as the ECO cars that are out there today.
By the way, the guy who started this thread is banned. But I will keep reading for fun.
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