Continue to Site

Welcome to our site!

Electro Tech is an online community (with over 170,000 members) who enjoy talking about and building electronic circuits, projects and gadgets. To participate you need to register. Registration is free. Click here to register now.

  • Welcome to our site! Electro Tech is an online community (with over 170,000 members) who enjoy talking about and building electronic circuits, projects and gadgets. To participate you need to register. Registration is free. Click here to register now.

Free energy?

Status
Not open for further replies.

Halogrunt1234

New Member
I recently watched an episode of mythbusters (on the discovery channel) and they did a myth on free energy, or getting electricity without paying for the kind made by power plants. they used 3 different designs all of which seemed completely overelaborate. such as one that gets electricity from the radio waves in the air. that one worked, only very badly. anotherone involved an eleborate construction of propane tanks filled with a little bit of propane in each of them and arranged in a wheel pattern. it used evaporation and condensation to turn a generator, but it moved EXTREMELY SLOW.

pretty much, they tested these ideas and busted the myth of free energy.
they didnt really explore the concept in detail though, as they were busy with other myths invovling burning, rockets, explosions, and catapults.

I have a few Ideas of generating electricity without human labor or paying a power plant.

1. for sunny regions
set up a parabolic array of mirrors which focus onto an aluminum (or other metal) container filled with water. the mirrors should direct light to the container, boiling the water inside. the steam from this water should be fuunneled and pressurized to turn a small turbine attached to a small generator. use the electricity from this generator to power a couple of home appliances or other electrical uses.
2. for rainy regions (like seattle)
making sure that your house's gutters are in good shape, attach a small water wheel along the drain pipe of your house's gutters to get a little electricity from the water that rushes through the drain pipe. for more power, construct a giant funnel and direct rainwater through a single hose to power a generator.
3. for windy areas (like great plains)
get a windmill
4. for coastal tidal regions
in a tidal zone, create a narrow canal so that water can flow up through the canal, turning a turbine, and flow back out the canal, again turning the turbine.

if you have any other ideas, post it in you reply.
 
Geothermal, drill a deep hole and pump water down, use the steam to generate electricity. Or, just use old faithful in Yellowstone park.

Get a great bill pile of poo and collect the methane produced. Compress it (the methane) and use it to power your generator or car.

Invent battery cows and produce milk and methane at the same time but from different orifices.

Grow a forest and burn the wood to generate electricity.

Genetically engineer hamsters to power a bigger wheel.

Mike.
 
The experts are way ahead of you.
1) Instead of using sunlight to heat water to drive steam turbines, they have been using nuclear energy for the heat. How many miles of mirrors would equal the power from one pound of uranium?
2) Instead of using a house's gutter for running water to drive a water-wheel-generator, they have been using huge Niagra Falls.
3) Many big windmills are expensive and need constant maintennance but we are getting more and more.
4) Since tidal movement is so slow, the energy harnessed would be very low unless the contraption is enormous. :lol:
 
1. These actually exist already... **broken link removed**

2. you could work out the math but im sure the power derived from such an endevor would be very little, and certainly not enough to cover the cost of construction. They do use small scale hydro electrics in small rivers in remote locations however, usually refered to as "micro hydroelectric" systems. Check this out: http://www.eere.energy.gov/consumerinfo/factsheets/ab2.html

3. Windmills dont work too well in some locations, unless they are extreamly high and large. Certainly no where near cost effective in most locations unless you build an extreamly large one. I think this one is really neat, look at the size of it: **broken link removed** , here is a good picture: **broken link removed**

4. They actually do this already. Its a really neat concept and can produce a great deal of power. check this out: http://www.darvill.clara.net/altenerg/tidal.htm
 
Hi,

You can recieve elctricity from the air, it was a project Tesla was working on.
He built this huge antenna to recieve elctricity, from what, not sure but it has to do with the unknown ether force.

Your idea of water falling off a house onto a water wheel was pretty good, Although try doing that under a water fall to get more power. Something like that is used under the Niagra Falls, also invented by Tesla.

You can learn more about Tesla Energy sucking antenna at:
http://www.amasci.com/
Really cool site!

Regards

D.J.
 
Tesla wasn't just sticking an antenna into the air to collect electricity. He was going to try to transmit energy using one antenna at the transmitting antenna (that was the one in New Jersey that was never completed) and other antennas to receive the energy. His dream was the equivalent of cellular power vs. cellular telephone.

Dean
 
Hi Dean,

IF I'm not mistaken, it was the was Wardenclyffe Project that Tesla used to recieve energy from the air.

Ofcourse he did not just stick an antenna up in the air and recieve. Although with the right antenna you can feel a shock.

I don't fully understand how he did it, but I don't think it was a radio reciever. Tesla, as you probably know, was into many dark siences that involved Ether and other unknown forces. He somehow was able to break down the nearfield around the antenna, and by doing this, was able to recieve elcetricity from the air.

Maybe becuase you are reading a differnet souce for this project, you are getting differnet information. Tesla already did not fully put his ideas out their and with the help of the governemt stealling his work, it is hard to find solid ground on what he exactly did.

Yes you are right the large scale Wardenclyffe Project was not finished.

Regards,

D.J.
 
e said:
1. These actually exist already... **broken link removed**

2. you could work out the math but im sure the power derived from such an endevor would be very little, and certainly not enough to cover the cost of construction. They do use small scale hydro electrics in small rivers in remote locations however, usually refered to as "micro hydroelectric" systems. Check this out: http://www.eere.energy.gov/consumerinfo/factsheets/ab2.html

3. Windmills dont work too well in some locations, unless they are extreamly high and large. Certainly no where near cost effective in most locations unless you build an extreamly large one. I think this one is really neat, look at the size of it: **broken link removed** , here is a good picture: **broken link removed**

4. They actually do this already. Its a really neat concept and can produce a great deal of power. check this out: http://www.darvill.clara.net/altenerg/tidal.htm
nice job..!!
1)i've seen a picture of the sterling engine one before.. very cool..
3) have you seen the www.otherpower.com site..they have a lot of personal wind power on the site..
4)they are planning to install something like this off our coast..
 
audioguru said:
The experts are way ahead of you.
1) Instead of using sunlight to heat water to drive steam turbines, they have been using nuclear energy for the heat. How many miles of mirrors would equal the power from one pound of uranium?
2) Instead of using a house's gutter for running water to drive a water-wheel-generator, they have been using huge Niagra Falls.

keep in mind that the ideas that I posted are for personal use, and probably will only succeed in lowering your power bill or chargeing batteries for later use. these are also opportunistic contraptions, meant only for use in ideal conditions (severe thunderstorm, very hot sunny day). I already know that there have been hydroelectric plants, especially in niagra due to the fact that it was one of the first of the type, and I knew that nuclear reactors use steam to power turbines.

again, these are just interesting ideas to save on the ever-climbing power bill, or just for fun. if there are any other people who have newer ideas on power generation, please post it here
 
hi, i am just wondering about the idea of having a mini turbine/water wheel attached or incased in a drain pipe. As project we are looking at a self powered rainwater or greywater harvesting system. We are hoping if we can get the required turbine/wheel that the falling water in the drain pipe would be strong enough to spin our wheel/turbine then allowing that to create the electricity needed to power a pump to pump it back up to a storage area in the attic where it will be distributed from there??????????????

Any information regarding this would be greatly appreciated.
 
If the guttering is higher than the tank in the attic, the water will flow there without pumps.

If the guttering is lower, you can get some, but not all, of the water up to the tank. The efficiency of a generator and pumps is very poor so you would be lucky to get more than a few percent of the water into the tank. You could try using an hydraulic ram Hydraulic ram - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia which avoids the need for electricity.

It might well be simpler to have a low level tank and a wind powered pump, that are off the shelf items. **broken link removed**
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Latest threads

New Articles From Microcontroller Tips

Back
Top