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Bicycle Turbine Charger
In modern times there has been a serious push towards clean renewable energy. The idea is to shift away from fossil fuels that power cars and power plants, due to their negative impact on the environment. A large portion of the urban population of the country has already stated switching from cars to bikes, a clean and self powered mode of transportation. While these bikers are going from place to place there is a lot of untapped potential in the wasted mechanical energy that they are creating. This is where the bike turbine charger design comes in. By attaching a small wind turbine, no bigger than a basket to the front of your bike, that untapped energy can be converted into electricity. This energy being used to charge small devices such as phones, tablets, or even rechargeable batteries. By harnessing this power we can cut down on power usage at home, leading to an overall reduction in carbon emissions of power plants.
Prototype
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The images above shows the complete first stage prototype being mounted onto a bicycle. An aluminum funnel was mounted and sealed using silicon around the turbine to increase the systems inlet airflow by acting like a nozzle. The bottom mounting mechanism was an immediate revision made to provide proper stability while the bike is in motion. Overall, the prototype's structural design was a success during testing. The bottom clamps take some time to mount, however this assembly feature can be addressed in later revisions.
Here the electrical components for the prototype can be seen. The wooden walls were added to channel the wind through the plastic box to prevent any turbulence or back flow that may have interfered with the turbine's rotation. For this prototype a PC cooling fan was modified to become a turbine generator for the USB charging port. The circuit layout if depicted below.
The turbine has undergone many technical design changes since the beginning. The original idea of a vertical turbine had been changed to a horizontal turbine due to efficiency, safety, and ergonomical problems. With the horizontal turbine the wind tunnel can capture and focus air to the turbine blades, in order to increase effective area of the turbine and increase the speed of the wind hitting the blades. With this new increase in efficiencies, lower speeds will be able to increase more power than before leading to an increase in the products effectiveness. While this is true, the current prototype does not capture enough wind to generate the required voltage of 7 volts. The necessary wind speed is 19 mph while the maximum wind speed we were able to clock on a bicycle is 15.4 mph.
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Our team of engineers are currently working to solving this issue. While we are still testing different wind tunnels to maximize the amount of air flow captured, this still may not be enough to reach the desired wind speeds. Also, the goal of this design is for any average bicyclist to use our product, therefore lower operating speeds are needed. The team is currently working on designing a custom built generator that is low enough torque to get the desired turbine RPMs at the low wind speeds available for a bicyclist.
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Technical Progress
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Team Engineer Andrew Bowser is shown testing the prototype out a car window. The cars speed is adjusted to provide different wind speeds to gauge the wind needed to produce a sufficient voltage in the USB port.
Team Engineer Peter Flood is shown testing the prototype mounted on his personal bicycle. In this case the USB is connected to MP3 player that needs to be charged. The prototype is functioning properly here but was not able to reach the necessary wind speeds discussed in the other video.
About Us
Peter Flood
Gianna Razza
Peter Juliano
Peter is a senior mechanical engineering student at the University at Buffalo. He has had multiple engineering internships and is well versed in design and production.
Peter is a senior mechanical engineering student and is graduating from the University at Buffalo this Fall 2017 semester. He’s been a part of UB’s Club Lacrosse Program since 2013.
Gianna is a Senior at University at Buffalo, majoring in Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering and Mathematics. She is a member of UB Design Club and Students for the Exploration and Development of Space (SEDS).
Andrew Bowser
John Khana
Andrew is a fifth year senior majoring in mechanical engineering and minoring in mathematics. He’s been a part of UB’s nanosatellite since 2016 and has been working with the attitude control and determination (ADAC) subsystem team.
John is a fifth year senior majoring in mechanical engineering and minoring in mathematics.
