Alternator Mods

[Christ]

Originally Posted by elhigh

You gave the foglight hole half a square meter!?

Oh, you so crazy. Or generous. Or - and this isn't completely outside the realm of possibility (though it is making an escape attempt) - that really is one mother of a foglight.

Any turbine that claims more than its face area is working from the maxim regarding fools and their money.

No, there actually are turbine designs that use more than the frontal area as kinetic energy surfaces.

You can make a parabola, make thin slices into it, and then turn the "fins" that you just cut so they're facing a "correct" angle into the wind. This means that there is more workable surface than just the frontal area, but it also slows down/changes wind direction to meet all the available surface area.

I suspect these designs are only good in areas with wind speeds over 50MPH, where normal prop-turbines are (apparently) not efficient. The design might be good for this, since it forces slowing of the air before making full surface contact, so very little of the surface area is wasted on slowing the air, while an area that's still larger than the exposed frontal area is being used to generate power at the new "lower" speed.

Of course, as speed of a fluid falls, pressure increases, which means that air "stacks" in the turbine, more so than with a traditional prop design.

I hope you can picture what I'm explaining, because I can't find an example of it.

And yes, that's one HONKIN' fog light.

[metalshark]

look they are right even if the turbine doubled its surface area and power it will still get a max of like 8 watts so no point even agnowledging that idea.

that company making the exhaust driven alternator has the right idea but they didnt take into account many extremly important factors.
by the looks of it it looks like it would be oil and water cooled if not then its a must.
why they put so much covering over the alternator puzzles me because the extreme temperatures would be held in there.
1. turbo housings absorb the brunt of heat that comes from the exhaust manifold and generaly end up glowing red after a hard drive.
2. the housing and turbine would spool up at different RPM's for different engines.
3. that flange is better for water and on a car exhaust it will only at the heat retention in the turbo housing.

heat + copper wire generator = melted wiring and a hunk of metal

[Daox]

Well, copper has a much higher melting point than aluminum (1,984F vs 1,220F), and turbos use aluminum housings. I think we'd be ok. I'd be more concerned about the resins inside that hold the windings together.

[Christ]

Originally Posted by Daox

Well, copper has a much higher melting point than aluminum (1,984F vs 1,220F), and turbos use aluminum housings. I think we'd be ok. I'd be more concerned about the resins inside that hold the windings together.

Why? High-Temp Epoxy Resin!

[metalshark]

Originally Posted by Daox

Well, copper has a much higher melting point than aluminum (1,984F vs 1,220F), and turbos use aluminum housings. I think we'd be ok. I'd be more concerned about the resins inside that hold the windings together.

I dont know what turbo's you put on your car but all the turbos I know the housing must be made of stainless steel, cast steel, or cast iron due to the fact that they have to withstand up to 1200 degrees coming from a high out put engine.

if you do see a turbo housing made of aluminum be sure to tell me so i will remember not to invest in it.

[Christ]

The exhaust housings are made from cast iron in most applications. The cold side housings and sometimes the cartridge are made of aluminum. I think the cartridges on both of my boosters are milled steel though.

[metalshark]

yep no reliable turbo has an exhaust housing made of aluminum due to the fact that 85% of heat flowing from the exhaust gets trapped there.

now mabe copper wont melt at 1200 derees but I have yet to see wiring that wont short under high heat. and yes they have the wiring insulated right by the exhaust housing.

[Christ]

Assuming they're using copper coils for the generator side of the setup, (I haven't looked into it... shame on me.) they could also be using a high-temp epoxy to seal the coils, which would resist melting at high heat. It's not hard to come by, honestly. I use it to seal up my dad's chimney cleaning door every year, since we only clean it out once a year, before the burn season starts.