i was thinking if i have to let air in to cool my radiator why not put that air to use.
i have included a rough drawing to help illustrate my idea
i know we talk about solar to help top off batteries and to help in those who have performed an alternator delete but the other abundant reusable resource besides water ,which is not good for your car, is air or wind. not since the air blowing by your car is going at least as fast as you are moving then there is no shortage of wind when driving. so why not use a small scale wind generator (like this one i found on ebay,
12VDC 2400RPM MINI WIND GENERATOR TURBINE PROJECT MOTOR - eBay (item 250603606228 end time Oct-20-10 16:47:13 PDT) )
my thoughts was to make an inlet in the bumper for air possiblly an air intake velocity funnel (
Air intake velocity funnel image by almc2242 on Photobucket ) these can increase the amount of air taken in by up to 20 percent but it also does not increase the frontal area of the aerodynamics of drilling a 20 percent bigger hole. from this tubing which cold be intake tubing or just pvc pipe would be run to the radiator. inside the tubing i would place the mini wind turbine generator so it would look like a jet engine. the wind in the intake would create 12 volts in my experimental idea. which could be used to top off a battery if you had a voltage regulator (
Solar Charger Regulator Contoller LCD Panel 20A 12V/24V - eBay (item 270643685984 end time Oct-05-10 02:19:39 PDT) ) or could be used for other things i guess.
so what do you guys think would this idea create alot of drag or are there any down sides to an approach like this