# car alternator on windmill for energy



## wtxprepper

I have heard from friends about putting a car alternator on a windmill for alternative energy anybody know how this is done


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## bigdogbuc

wtxprepper said:


> I have heard from friends about putting a car alternator on a windmill for alternative energy anybody know how this is done


Try Youtube. I have no doubt you will find something there. The biggest problem I see with it would be the weight of the fan assembly creating too much downward load on the bearings and sooner than later, burning up the bearings. And alternators aren't cheap. You would also need to research what type of alternator would be best for the batteries you intend on using, along with using the correct power inverter. Just make sure you look at the WHOLE system. It's kind of like those guys who put Cold Air Intakes on their little Fast and Furious cars without changing the injectors, the exhaust or re-mapping the computer; You accomplish nothing other than spending money with zero gain in performance.


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## rickkyw1720pf

Biggest problem is getting the wind to run it at optional speed. 1000 to 3000 rpm


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## HuntingHawk

Another big problem is the torque required to get it turning.


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## Piratesailor

if you're leaning that way, as suggested, look on youtube or do a google search for home made marine wind generators. Plenty out there.


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## LunaticFringeInc

rickkyw1720pf said:


> Biggest problem is getting the wind to run it at optional speed. 1000 to 3000 rpm


That's what I was about to mention but he beat me to it. That's the RPM range at which they were designed to work at. Getting a windmill to turn at that speed would be a pretty tough feat I would imagine. You might be better off trying to use a lawn mower engine to turn a car altenator and create power but then that kind of defeats your purpose of using the wind. Buy hey, I am no electrician!


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## Rigged for Quiet

rickkyw1720pf said:


> Biggest problem is getting the wind to run it at optional speed. 1000 to 3000 rpm


You don't necessarily need the windmill to reach this rpm, you need the windmill to turn the primary gears that will turn the secondary gears that will reach the desired rpm.


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## wtxprepper

alright I appreciate it, I was asking cuz I have three windmills on my land that I dont have setup to pump water anymore, so I figured might find another use for them


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## Rigged for Quiet

If you have good ol' fashioned real deal wind mills, and not the small wind generator thingies you are ahead of the torque game by a long shot!


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## vandelescrow

There was a show on I think discovery channel call "the colony". I think it was Season 2, but it was filmed in an abandoned part of Louisiana after the hurricane and it was an experiment in survival. In this season they used a car alternator, made a wind mill, joined the two by use of a 10 speed bicycle gears and chain. It worked fine for them but for long term, who knows.

Maybe you can google that and see how they made it.


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## Chipper

Simple gear reduction using different sized pulleys/chains or a transmission. Trans off a lawn mower or bikes.


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## HuntingHawk

You might be able to rig something that 12mph wind will turn it but takes a 20mph wind to get it to start turning.


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## bigdogbuc

vandelescrow said:


> There was a show on I think discovery channel call "the colony". I think it was Season 2, but it was filmed in an abandoned part of Louisiana after the hurricane and it was an experiment in survival. In this season they used a car alternator, made a wind mill, joined the two by use of a 10 speed bicycle gears and chain. It worked fine for them but for long term, who knows.
> 
> Maybe you can google that and see how they made it.


I miss that show. :sad: I can't believe they stopped production.


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## vandelescrow

bigdogbuc said:


> I miss that show. :sad: I can't believe they stopped production.


They discontinued it? Dang, that was one of the few shows I watched.


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## Mule13

that was an awesome show, and an automotive alternator (and i havent looked this up) but they start charging at a relativly low rpm and charge all the way thru the engines rpm range so the only real problem would be getting a heavy fan going. also go to a junk yard theres tons of alternatrors out there for 10 or 15 $ each. i got a 105 amp alternator for my little samurai for 15$ at the junk yard it was nearly new.also seems there are internal and external regulated alternators. not sure that would be a problem in a system like home use as you would have a regulator built in anyway.

i also have a question for someone that knows about these systems. say you had a solar system up and running already with the solar panels. could you hook up a wind driven alternator like this into the same regulator with the panels and charge with both? thinking about it it seems like ti would work, no matter what you put into the regulator it only charges at a certain volt/amp right?? so fi your charging from the soalr panels during the day and the wind kicks up you'd still be charging at 12 volts just sending more amps, so the regulator (in theory) should absorb the max amps it can and send to batterys and then negate the rest? is this correct?


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## wtxprepper

yeah I'm a mechanic by trade so I have plenty of good alternator laying around and these are the real deal 36 foot windmills with 3 foot blades, I'm definitely looking more into it, thanks for the input everybody


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## PaulS

You will need about 6:1 gearing to get the alternator to turn the minimum of 1000 rpm to reach a decent charge. To get the maximum from it you will need 4 - 5000 rpm.

You can color one of the windmill blades and count how man times it rotates in one minute. That is the rpm of the wind mill. Divide the 3000 that you need by that number and you will have a good idea what the gear ratio is. A bike chain and sprocket set is a good low drag drive - better than a belt or gears and easier to set up.


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## PalmettoTree

This likely has been said but in case it has not: it seems to me you need a gear drive that with each turn caused by the wind the alternator will turn 100 times. That will get the weight off the alternator bearings but you will need more than a breeze and an efficient blades. Or just do what Paul said.

It will make a good science fair project but you will not get such a system to pay for itself in most of the US.

Northern Indiana is doing ok.


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## budgetprepp-n

I don't think the weight of a fan blade would be enough weight to effect the bearings at all. Think about how tight a serpentine
belt is. And that's at the end of the shaft pulling down on the pulley a few pounds of fan weight is nothing compared to that.
And the idea of using a bicycle chain and sprockets is a great idea. Low drag, Easy to find parts, And the DIY would not
need to be as precise as a gear set up. Easy to find big sprockets for the fan and easy to find sprockets small for the alternator.
Also a very large fan with light weight blades doesn't take much to get it going look how big the fans at a wind farm
and they will start with just a little breeze. (there are some close to where I live) It comes down to cubic inches of fan
blade surface to resistance. An alternator free spins until it's turning fast enough to "kick in" so to speak.
I'm not sure but I think there is a kit to convert an alternator over for wind mill use. (works at a slower speed)

Note: The alternator was invented because when cars only had generators the battery would go dead if the car was left
idling with the lights on (like a police car) because a generator had to spin so fast to put out a charge. An alternator will
charge at idle speeds and put out much more. On some cars if you turn on the lights while idling you can actually hear
the alternator "kick in"


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## Scotty12

Stipid bearing friction fix. Slick 50 and oil?


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## Scotty12

I think perhaps you would have to depend on the weight of the blade to turn the alternator fast enough to get power. Maybe sheet metal. A serpentine belt would be entirely too tight unless you had a larger, heavier blade and a lot of wind. Force= Mass/Acceleration. Water would probably the low end torque need to turn the alternator. I'm a psych major so I may have absolutely no idea what the hell I'm talking about. Sounds good to me.


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## Prepadoodle

Alternators produce 3-phase AC, and can be either delta configuration or wye configuration. Delta wound ones will output more current at lower RPMs, wye outputs more voltage. Diodes in the alternator typically rectify this into DC to charge your battery.

Alternators come in many sizes. 60 amps to about 200 amps are common.

A common small wind turbine might output 600 watts at 12VDC. This turbine would produce a max of about 35-50 amps, and use a rotor a little over 4 feet in diameter. At an average 12MPH wind speed, it would output about 90kW a month. (12mph average wind is kinda windy)

So yeah, it could be done. Keep in mind that the commercial models use very efficient computer optimized 3 blade rotors made of lightweight composites. If you're gonna make your own, they would probably have to be bigger, maybe a lot bigger. (depending on what alternator you use) This would lead to greater rotating mass, and it would take more wind to get them going.

Commercial turbines also have over-speed protection built in. Small ones typically limit the RPMs to 1300 or so. You don't want them to fly apart in high winds.

I wouldn't hang the rotor directly off the alternator. I would use a shaft running in pillow blocks to carry the load and maybe have a thrust bearing at the end of the shaft too. You could then add your pulley or sprocket to this short shaft and have the alternator alongside, connected with a belt or chain. I would probably opt for a belt because it would allow slippage in extreme conditions instead of breaking something.

Don't forget about thrust forces either. A rotor is basically a sail, the wind is trying to push it backwards. Your tower has to be able to withstand this force. Of course, you could also add guy wires to carry this load to ground anchors.

Sounds like an interesting project. Good luck!


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## HuntingHawk

Another option is a vertical axis wind turbine which you can build that externally you can funnel more wind to the blades.


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## wtxprepper

we have 15 to 20mph wind here daily and alot of the time up to 50 mph wind gusts thats just a normal day, so wind aint a problem


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## wtxprepper

yeah pillar bearings and shaft was the idea I was running with my sprocket attached to it and smaller sprocket on my alternator attached below


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## BigCheeseStick

I read this article sometime back and it came to mind reading this thread.

A small creek provides plenty of power for this off-grid home by Scott Gentleman

I know, not wind power. But a streams flow is pretty reliable as a source.

If all else fails: Homemade electric power by Jim Van Sant


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## bigdogbuc

I'm just gonna' build my own generator using a lawn mower engine. Somebody dumped a mower (looks brand new) across the alley behind my house. I thought it might be the neighbors, but then it sat there for over a month. Yesterday they came out to water their bushes along the alley and pushed the mower into my yard. They're asses and I don't like them. I mean really, push a lawn mower off your property, across the alley and into mine, then walk away? But these are also the same people that accused my 7 year old daughter of stealing one of their ducks. After breaking through a locked, 6 ft. privacy fence. ???

So I said fine, I have a use for it.

So my plan is to remove the engine from the deck, hard mount the engine, mount a pulley to the shaft and then set up an electrical system to run an alternator and charge batteries. Along with a power inverter and some gas, I'm good to go. I can at least run the fridge and the freezer. Don't know what I'll do if there's no gas though. But, it's the best I can do. Wind power is not viable for me where I'm at and the trees along the south property line are too tall for solar (or a dish). Plus we're pretty gray through the fall and winter months.

And after reading this thread, wind sounds too complicated for me to want to mess with, given the potential for little output.


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## BigCheeseStick

Takes the "do it yourself and save money" fun aspect out of it, but I picked this little guy up at Autozone for only $89 bucks two years ago and have run it a fair number of times since getting it. Pretty reliable. Worst case scenario was after sitting for three months it didn't start after 5 pulls so I gave it a squirt of starter fluid and it roared to life (no problems after that). I've tested it with an amperage meter and an adjustable hot plate. It'll run up to 850 watts continuous happily.
View attachment 2424


At least around here Autozone still sells this same unit. When it's on sale its still the same price.

I tested our fridge, washing machine, and about everything else we own. Only thing this little guy won't run is the cloths drier. Sure there are bigger geny's out there, but the bigger they are the faster they drink precious fuel! This one is still on it's first gallon of gas after _several hours_ use!


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## budgetprepp-n

The weight of the fan blades that would be on the alternator bearing is nothing compared to how many of pounds pull
a serpentine belt has pulling down on the bearings when it's in a car. The best way to build a windmill out of a car alternator 
is to use a kit that is just for that. You can buy the fiberglass blades brackets or any of the stuff you need all together or one
piece at a time. The stuff inside is changed over to a different set up and it will have magnets inside. This makes it so at low RPM
will put out a decent amount of electric. check it out. This is the chart for my windmill and it's a cheapie.


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## Rigged for Quiet

BigCheeseStick said:


> Takes the "do it yourself and save money" fun aspect out of it, but I picked this little guy up at Autozone for only $89 bucks two years ago and have run it a fair number of times since getting it. Pretty reliable. Worst case scenario was after sitting for three months it didn't start after 5 pulls so I gave it a squirt of starter fluid and it roared to life (no problems after that). I've tested it with an amperage meter and an adjustable hot plate. It'll run up to 850 watts continuous happily.
> View attachment 2419
> 
> 
> At least around here Autozone still sells this same unit. When it's on sale its still the same price.
> 
> I tested our fridge, washing machine, and about everything else we own. Only thing this little guy won't run is the cloths drier. Sure there are bigger geny's out there, but the bigger they are the faster they drink precious fuel! This one is still on it's first gallon of gas after _several hours_ use!


The attatchment in't showing up and says it's an invalid attaatchment. What is it?


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## BigCheeseStick

Rigged for Quiet said:


> The attatchment in't showing up and says it's an invalid attaatchment. What is it?


Fixed. I think (shows on mine now). Also here's a link. Looks like they put a amperage gauge on them now that mine doesn't have. Power Pro/1000 Watt gasoline/oil mix generator (56100) | Portable Generator | AutoZone.com

Forgot to mention they supply both 120vac, and 12vdc so you can charge batteries or run 12v accessories off them to.

They spec. it at 5hrs run time at half load. I'm at around 7hrs running at various load rates and still have some fuel sloshing around in the tank.
View attachment 2425
View attachment 2426


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## Rigged for Quiet

Thanks. Have you had any issues with fouled plugs beings it's a 2 stroke?


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## BigCheeseStick

Good question. Just went and pulled the plug out. The original plug is obviously the right one. When I bought the generator I also bought a NGK replacement plug just in case (left), but haven't had any need for it as yet. The original plug still looks fine imo.

View attachment 2427


I put the plug back in, slid the choke over to full (even though its 87 deg out), and it started on the second pull after sitting about two months.


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