| Thermopile, let extract some electricity from heat without steam - Click HERE for Original Thread |
| jacquesl |
I want to build a Thermopile to generate usable electricity with a heat source, like a small fire or something,
I can build something like this but, I only get 1 mA and an ant of a volt. And it subjected to 1700C blow torch, it sucks.
So does anyone have some info about that, would be nice, to light a candle and then your able to watch a DVD |
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| pinkmouse |
Jacques, please do some research, and read up on the laws of thermodynamics. This is, in principle, no different to any of your questions from your other threads.
Here is a good place to start.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laws_of_thermodynamics |
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| pinkmouse |
| And just so I don't seem totally negative, here is your best bet for getting energy from heat. |
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| jacquesl |
Yip, thanks pinkmouse, I’ve already checked out Laws of thermodynamics and also have tried to build a Stirling engine, but did not work so nice, I’m looking something more into solid state device and for something with a high wattage output.
How I see it, it sucks up a lot of watts to heat up n heating element, say like 1000W heater. But if you apply 1000W heat source to some thermocouples, you will newer get that 1000W back, I belief if you can covert something to another thing, then you can surely convert it back with at least 100% back in theory, but mostly we strive near |
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| jrevillug |
[geeky, boring scientist mode]
Thermocouple power sources are horrendoulsy inefficient- about 10%. Therefore, you cannot get 'at least 100% back'. Not possible. The thermo couple is a heat engine:
____________
| Heat Source|
_____|_______
(Heat engine)-------> |useful work|
_____|___
|Heat sink|
(I apologise at my first attempt at ASCII drawing)
The heat energy moves from the heat source through the heat engine, where it produces useful work, and then the waste energy goes to the heat sink.
In a perfect heat engine, once the useful work is produced, there are no more losses, but in practice this is not the case (E.g. friction in an Internal Combustion Engine (ICE)).
The maximum theoretical effiecency of a 'perfect heat engine' is:
1- Temperature of 'heat sink'
__ Temperature of heat source.
All temperatures for this formula must be in Kelvin, not F or C.
To increase the output of the thermocouple, increase the area of the junction between the dissimilar metals, heat the hot end more and cool the 'cold' side (one metal on each 'side'). The first will increase the amount of electricity, but not the efficiency, the second two will improve the efficiency.
The Stirling engine is a more complex bit of kit, but can be significantly more efficeient (e.g. 20-30% or more).
However, running your TV and DVD player from a candle just isn't going to happen. Not possible. There is just not enough power from the flame (approx 40 watts, so using a realistic 5% thermocouple, you get 2 watts of electricity).
It would be lovely to convert energy from one form to another very efficiently, but it is extremely difficult. It is easier and more efficient to go from a 'high level' energy type (Electricity) to a low form (heat, light) than it is to go the other way. This is because to go from heat to another form of energy, you have to make use of a heat engine (see above)- you can't just heat a wire and expect electricity.
The best heat engines of today- multi-stage steam turbines in power stations and 'Cathedral Diesels' (Huge, 15M tall, 50-100rpm ship diesels) work at about 50% efficiency.
[/geeky, boring scientist mode]
If you want 'clean' electricity and heat, then grow your own wood (e.g. short rotation willow coppice), and then use a wood gasifier. You can then use the wood gas to run a stirling engine or even an ICE to produce electricity. The waste heat from the engine's 'cold' side (exhaust, cooled end of Stirling or thermocouple) can then be used for domestic heating. There is a lot of work involved though.
James |
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| Cal Weldon |
I think Jacques needs to tap into an otherwise wasted power source. Like water running down a drain or downspout or the heat that goes up the flue of a gas heater or little children and pets on a treadmill or something that gives infinite return as it is otherwise wasted. So far he has only requested the holy grail.
How many thousands of trained, skilled and forethinking individuals do you think are looking for the same thing right now? Jacques, if the things you are looking for existed, do you really think you'd find those ideas here? For free?
Shake thy head man. |
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| I_Forgot |
I seem to recall reading about some satellites that have a nuclear power generator that essentially just gets hot and is surrounded by many thousands of thermocouples to power the electronics on the thing. Don't ask me why they don't use solar panels...
I_F |
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| DSP_Geek |
| quote: | Originally posted by I_Forgot
I seem to recall reading about some satellites that have a nuclear power generator that essentially just gets hot and is surrounded by many thousands of thermocouples to power the electronics on the thing. Don't ask me why they don't use solar panels... |
Inverse square law (go twice the distance from the sun, get a quarter the power per square inch) kicks in with a vengeance past the orbit of Mars, plus it also works against you for radio transmitters.
Jupiter is a bit more than five times Earth's distance from the sun, so you get about 4% of solar power available here. It's worse for Saturn. Forget Uranus, and at Neptune the sun is merely a very bright star. |
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| jacquesl |
| quote: | | I seem to recall reading about some satellites that have a nuclear power generator that essentially just gets hot and is surrounded by many thousands of thermocouples to power the electronics on the thing. Don't ask me why they don't use solar panels... |
I’m getting the idea NASA already solve the problem with thermocouples, because they have some clever people working at high peak and getting big pays to solve this kind of problems, 5% efficient for heat to electricity is just ****, useless
I know in today’s life, we are all generating electricity from motion, via alternators and spinning rotors, but one of the nice thing are starting to get popular, sonar energy, solid state, that’s nice man. It’s starting to get more efficient with our new technology in progress.
| quote: | | How many thousands of trained, skilled and forethinking individuals do you think are looking for the same thing right now? Jacques, if the things you are looking for existed, do you really think you'd find those ideas here? For free? |
Your right man, I probably won’t find a thing, what will give me more that 1 mA at 1700C, but maybe, you never know, just maybe someone founds the right thing, and decides to share it with us, that would be nice but not impossible. |
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| jrevillug |
The Nasa thermocouples have the benefit of having an extremely low external temperature- about 3K. Also, they are inefficient, but they don't provide a lot of energy.
If you read my post, you will see that i suggest that you increase the surface area of your thermocouple, and cool one side of it to increase the output.
james |
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| jacquesl |
" increase the surface area of your thermocouple, and cool one side of it to increase the output. "
Yip, like adding a heat sink to the one side and a flame to the other side, that’s my plan.
" The Nasa thermocouples have the benefit of having an extremely low external temperature- about 3K "
So how can I be able to make one end freeze by only using electricity ? I’ve seen a example on a “Peltier effect” CPU cooler, it uses electricity to cool down something, without any vacuum pump and some condensers and all the necessary stuff. And it’s just a flat piece of white pad that freezes. Weird, can I make something like that, it can also be used to reverse the effect |
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| martin clark |
It's called the Seebeck effect, and so yes, Peltier coolers do work in reverse. Fit a heatsink one side and warm the other, it'll be more efficient than your DIY attempt - but still pretty poor.
PS don't apply your blowtorch to a peltier in the hope of vast amounts of power... al the brazed joints will fall apart. |
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| jacquesl |
I must first get a peltier device but, Yes, I know, It will be pretty much screw it up if I do it.
I’ve got no idea how a peltier works inside and will like to build one, if it’s possible?
2 peltier devices, connected back to back, it could be nice to see what happens, one takes heat and the other one makes heat or cool again, it’s must be 100% efficient to get the best result of course, and it’s using only wires to transfer the heat, it would be interesting, to play around with it. |
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| martin clark |
You've got to abandon that notion of 100+% efficiency...
Two back-to-back peltiers will be truly dismal, anyway.
A peltier device is simply a stack of thermocouples connected in series BTW. |
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| jacquesl |
Does it contain a couple of wide spreading plates stacked on top of each over, it’s not been made clear, or do some just simply not know?
Ok, I’ll drop that 100% efficient for this millennium |
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| pjpoes |
I think I have seen this around before, so I'm sure I'm not sharing anything new with you, but have you thought about building yourself a free engergy device. Lots of Tesla's idea's work to a point, they just aren't that practical, and I have seen plans for some of his free engergy devices around before. We built one in school once, the device was essentially as tall as the school, and only gave us a few ma of current and a couple of volts, but hey, it was free. We were able to power an LED with it.
He also had a design for a pump which used the natural adhesion of water on a surface to create the necassary friction to move water along. It had a long series of smooth plates at a slight angle, and was able to move water or I believe gases with much better efficiency that most current designs. I remember reading about a group trying to market a modern manufactured version not that long ago, and they had built a very effecient generator from one as well. |
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| jacquesl |
I’ve already tried to built a dozen but nothing works, so I want to built something that can work, and I don’t know any tesla workable devices, besides the telsa turbine, it’s just a turbine
“We built one in school once, the device was essentially as tall as the school, and only gave us a few ma of current and a couple of volts, but hey, it was free”
I would be glad, if you can give me some info how you made that device at that school project.?
Lol. “the device was essentially as tall as the school” for real ?
The only free energy I can get, will be to nick someone car battery |
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| valveitude |
jacquesl-
I don't mean to offend, but if you really want to get off the grid..in this lifetime..you need to start looking at what has already been tried..and failed. Nothing is free, and using all your energy chasing "pie in the sky" technoligies is great fun, as far as mental masturbation goes, but isn't going to get you any practical results any time soon.
Don't get me wrong, there are alternatives, but the ones you've been chasing have already been chased for a long time, by a lot of people. Of all the options I looked at (and I spent the better part of 10 years looking while I lived in the Cascade mountains),a little known invention by Wally Mento was the best option for a low tech, DIY option. Check it out...
http://amasci.com/freenrg/minto.html
-Casey |
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| valveitude |
Here are the Google results for my search if you want to investigate further.
Rather than building one big wheel, consider putting several smaller ones on a common shaft.
-Casey |
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| jacquesl |
I must tell you, I’ve never heard of this Wally Minto's Wonder Wheel.
Thanks man, It’s dam nice, it looks it might just work, I wonder what type of low boiling liquid with work the best without igniting then to then heated to much, how about Benzene, it evaporates very fast. |
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| valveitude |
| quote: | | I must tell you, I’ve never heard of this Wally Minto's Wonder Wheel. |
It's most unfortunate that not many people have.
| quote: | | Thanks man, It’s dam nice, it looks it might just work, I wonder what type of low boiling liquid with work the best without igniting then to then heated to much, how about Benzene, it evaporates very fast. |
It most certainly works. Popular Science wouldn't have written it up if it didn't. I don't know what restrictions are in place in your country regarding Freon, but that would be the liquid of choice. Using Freon, you only need a temperature differential of 3.5 degrees F.. A black tarp over a tub of water would give you that easy.
-Casey |
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| jacquesl |
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freon
I’ve also never have heard of this chemical.
But if I can get it, it would be nice.
Do you by any change know if this device have the power to deliver power, like to drive a alternator and did you ever tried to build it, to check it out ? |
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| valveitude |
You need to read the article I linked to again, as well as the others listed in the Google search.
A 40 ft. wheel (or 10 4 ft. wheels on a common shaft) produces 8.69 hp, thats 6.48 Kw. The speed needs to be increased around a thousand times (it's all torque at low speed) through a tandem of 10to1 pulley/belt setups to get a usable speed to drive an alternator..but it most certainly will.
A point on alternators. You can fairly easily get up to 5 Kw out of an alternater by replacing the diode bridge with higher voltage ones, and modifying the field coil circut to produce 120 volts instead of 12, its the current limitations of the alternator that limits the theoretical output. 5Kw is the limit the alternator bearings can handle.
I was living in an area that was covered in snow and ice 8 months out of the year when I researched it, and have since moved to an area with cheap, clean Hydro power. I lost interest and never built one, but did enough homework to know it would work.
If I still had my notes I would share, but I don't. All of this is proven and low tech enough that if your serious, I suspect you could get a fully functional power plant up within a year, and an investment under $5K.
Besides the net, I would look at Lindsay's Books, for both the technology of alternators, as well as instruction material on the mechanics involved. Starting with this one.
Good luck ;)
-Casey |
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| jacquesl |
| I am thinking more in building a small scale version, than a monster machine. Just to start of, it can be +- 400W just like my UPS. And the heat can be the sun or some burning wood or alcohol, with a high efficient heater. |
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| jacquesl |
| Does anyone know about his so called love meter thingy. If you hold the down part is your hand then and the liquid sucks up. |
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| valveitude |
| quote: | | Does anyone know about his so called love meter thingy. |
:D :D Anybody who doesn't know about Wally's Wheel, or is familiar with that novelty toy, has got to think your nuts.
It does in fact demenstrate the very principle's involved, but works because of the short distance, and the skinny capillary between the bulbs. I think one of them dead smart guys invented it :).
It uses alcohol. |
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| I_Forgot |
I don't believe it.
Look at the diagram. The claim is that it was running at 1 rpm. Think about what that means. The liquid in the bottom bottle is supposed to boil and recondense in the top bottle. At 1 rpm it has to boil and condense in 1/4 second (there are 4 bottles and each has to pass through the water tank). I find it hard to believe you'll be able to transfer enough energy from the warm water to the liquid in the bottle to boil it all (or enough to make the thing turn) in 1/4 second.
Think about large bottles of liquids and the mechanical support structure plunging into and out of the water tank 4 times per second. There's going to be a lot of work done to push the water aside. There's also going to be a hell of a lot of splashing.
There's no free lunch guys. The heat transferred has to be equivalent to the work required to raise the liquid from the bottom to the top bottle, which is what has to happen.
Imagine a large wheel. The tube will have to be large diameter to transfer the large amount of liquid/gas to the top bottle rapidly. What will prevent the liquid from condensing in the long tube and falling back into the bottom bottle?
This is why you don't see them everywhere: it doesn't work.
I_F |
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| Grumpy_Git |
Surely at 1 RPM it would require 15 seconds not 1/4 seconds? :confused:
maybe I'm being super dumb, which is entirely possible, I would think that it would work better with multiples of 3 bottles to get the balance off the vertical. or possibly with one way valves in a complete ring around the bottles
Nick.
Nice Idea, might try it with glass bottles and alcohol as a cheap experiment. Obviously using higher temperatures generated inefficiently. |
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| valveitude |
| quote: | | This is why you don't see them everywhere: it doesn't work. |
I wont argue with your math, but a couple of things to consider.
The "1 rpm" claim was made by the reporter witnessing it (best guess), and the big wheel was never made to see if it would work. The key here is that the prototype was witnessed by an experienced science/technology reporter for Popular Science during their "salad days" before becoming what we see today.
Wally Minto was no charlatan. He had several write up's in the mag.
I believe the reason we don't see them around is two fold..1) a heck of a lot of work to construct a huge device for such a minimal output, and 2) It wouldn't be the first time something was developed for the "third world" that was rejected with the question "If it's so good, why aren't you using it?"
-Casey |
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| I_Forgot |
| quote: | Originally posted by Grumpy_Git
Surely at 1 RPM it would require 15 seconds not 1/4 seconds? :confused: |
Oops! You're right.
I still don't believe it is practical.
I_F |
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| jacquesl |
Check out my love meter, lol
Hi-res vid! |
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| valveitude |
Edit:I-Forgot..we were posting at the same time, so I didn't see your back peddle before I wrote this post.
| quote: | | I still don't believe it is practical. |
First it doesn't work, now it works but isn't practical :xeye:
Define practical. By modern methods of producing energy it's not, was never intended to be. But for a low tech approach that doesn't need to produce "big time" power, with no consideration of the size required, it could be quite practical.
Skeptisism is a good thing..but you can have too much of a good thing.
I have followed along these "free energy follies" threads from the begining for the entertainment value, and you have been a good warrior for sanity, but in this case I think your mindset has gotten the better of you.
-Casey |
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| rcavictim |
This is really interesting. I have known abiout this principle for as long as I can remember but never gave it a thought in recent years when I am now very actively head scratching and putting hardware together to power my farm estate which has a commercial quality wind resource.
Didn`t know the name of the inventor listed here either. Must do some further research. This could be worth building. A mechanical power source that makes 4 horsepower 24-7, is all I need to make 48 kW hours each day of useable electricity through a battery bank and inverter setup.
Propane is practical as a working fluid I think but the head pressure of around 125 PSI limits what you can use for the rotating tanks. I wonder what liquid ether would do instead?
Anyone have any other suggestions for possible working fluids? |
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| theAnonymous1 |
Once your finished building your magic wheel you can connect it to one of these.......
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ct...temnumber=45416
I picked one of these up at the local harborfreight store a couple years ago. I had planned to build my own generator, but I moved and lost my only work space; and ambition. So for now its just sitting in storage.
If all else fails you can connect it to a treadmill and and throw some of the local children on it. |
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| theAnonymous1 |
| quote: | Originally posted by rcavictim
[BAnyone have any other suggestions for possible working fluids? [/B] |
What about R134a? It's cheap and readily available. You can pick it up at wal-mart or the local auto parts store. |
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| I_Forgot |
| quote: | Originally posted by valveitude
Edit:I-Forgot..we were posting at the same time, so I didn't see your back peddle before I wrote this post.
First it doesn't work, now it works but isn't practical :xeye:
Define practical. ... in this case I think your mindset has gotten the better of you.
-Casey |
Yes, I'm not afraid to back-pedal when I see error in my thinking.
Practical- defined here as something that produces useful work comparable to that produced by other methods of similar or higher cost and/or complexity.
My mindset is just fine. Reason and understanding are still the only way anything technological gets accomplished. Politics is another matter...
I_F |
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| valveitude |
I-Forgot-
As I alluded to in the portion of your quote of me that was truncuated, I have been admiring your thought process during these "debates". I see nothing wrong with your "mind set" per se.
| quote: | | Practical- defined here as something that produces useful work comparable to that produced by other methods of similar or higher cost and/or complexity. |
M-kay, please point out another approach that is less complicated, has an efficiency greater than 80%, and requires less "care and feeding" than a wheel turning 1 RPM..Oh ya, and can be cobbled together with basic skills, tools, and materials.
I don't view this as a "save the world" Holy Grail..just a slick implementation of basic physics, that under the right conditions (you've got the space, and you dont need boo-koo power) could be very practical.
-Casey |
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| jacquesl |
| quote: | Originally posted by jacquesl
Check out my love meter, lol
Hi-res vid! |
http://www.microchemicals.com/solvents.html
something Metil Alkol
Methanol boiling point - 64.7 °C
And acetone, boiling point 56.3 °C <<------ easy available for me
If you check out the video It’s only 100K, you can see how it will works, it’s interesting
Nice low boiling point
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R134a |
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| valveitude |
I-Forgot-
| quote: | | Further checking turns up this site: |
Cool..I hadn't seen that one. I good example of how not to build one. Like a lot of Tesla enthusiasts, Mother Earth didn't pay attention to the details.
Thanx for the link.
-Casey |
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| jacquesl |
| This wonder wheel uses gravity also in its favor, nice, it’s like a gravity + heat engine. |
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| Nordic |
| They tried building one on mythbusters -- didn't work |
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