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Current and future renewable energy topics explained and discussed.
Free Bicycle Generator Plans
Building a bicycle generator to generate electricity has always interested me. So I’ve decided to do an article on how to build a bike generator and how useful one can be. Be careful when working with electricity and don’t attempt anything written below without knowledge of what you are doing which may be outside the scope of these pages.
First let’s cover how useful it can be to generate electricity from a bike generator. There are two different ways the electricity from the bike can be used. The first is using it directly to power a device. The average rider can produce 150 to 200 Watts when going at a moderate pace. Some professional riders can generate 300 to 500 Watts. You can power a device that uses under the produced wattage directly with pedaling. The other way to use the bike generator would be charging batteries which would allow you to power larger devices after you’ve built up a charge. Multiple batteries can be connected and charged in unison to build up enough to power devices for a very long time.
How long could you power something on batteries from the electricity generated by the bike?
A laptop computer might draw around 90W every hour. This number is voltage * amps which is written you can find on any electric device. So, to figure out how many hours our bike generator could power a 90W laptop we’ll use the following formula.
175W * 1 hour = 90W * hours
…which results in…
Hours = 175/90 hours = 1.9 hours
This means that you could power a 90W laptop for 1.9 hours for 1 hour of pedaling. Not a bad return on your work but this is simply theory. In reality there will be some loss and 175W is for someone of average size in good shape. However, even when allowing for loss and variation in rider size this is a pretty good return on something you might be doing anyway for exercise.
How can you build a biycle generator for electricity?
There are a few basic components that will allow you to build a bicycle generator. First let’s cover these parts and what they do.
These parts fit together to form a bike generator for electricity. The stand listed below and most stands come with a method of providing resistance which can easily be removed. Then the DC generator can attach in its place and be connected to the bike by resting it against the wheel or removing the wheel and using a rubber pulley. The DC generator connects to the charge controller which connects to the battery. This setup now allows you to charge the battery. However, to run consumer electronics or other electrical devices from the battery you’ll need to connect it to the inverter. Then from the inverter you can plug devices in directly.
Keep in mind that the numbers listed above are a best scenario situation. It doesn’t account for efficiency of the electronics involved. For example, inverters are usually around 80% efficient when converting DC to AC. This means you lose 20% just in the conversion. There are a lot of ways this setup can be changed which will provide better or worse performance from the system. The generator might have more or less amperage which also means more or less resistance. The charge controller will be rated for a maximum amperage so can be more or less depending on how many amps your generator will be creating. The battery will vary in voltage and amp hour capacity but should always be deep cycle since they will be fully drained often. The inverter will be rated for a maximum wattage. This will need to be higher or lower depending on the maximum Wattage (Amps * Volts) of the device being powered by the batteries.
These are all factors that you’ll need to account for depending on what you purchase. Listed below are the major parts necessary to create a bicycle generator with a 12V 33 Amp Hour battery and 400W inverter allowing devices up to 400W to be used. A 400W device would be powered for a little under an hour by the battery. Multiple batteries hooked up would provide more charge to be stored although you’ll need to pedal more to fill them.
Bike training stand to mount generator on and hold bike.
400 Watt inverter to convert DC to AC and provide plug for devices.
12 Volt 33 Amp hour Deep Cycle battery will run 33 amps at 12 Volts for one hour.
12 Volt 30 Amp Charge Controller prevents overcharging and undercharging your battery.
DC Permanent Magnet Generator for converting your physical work into electrical energy.