The Bicycle Generators

So it seems that our plan is too complicated for the time that we have remaining. Instead of using the 95 volt motor with a belt and making something to hold it all, we purchased a 24 volt motor and are going to mount to the back of the bicycle. We are going to directly have the motor connect to the pedal area to generate power to charge something. The new motor should arrive on Monday. This should be very easy and quick to finish.

We are finally mounting the motor today. We are doing everything vertically meaning it will all be in a straight line and are adding a gear to create torque and tension to generate more watts. Also, we are using a piece of steel from the old solar car to use as the base for our motor. This is going to turn out great!

Change of plans... We will be using two strips of metal as a base for our motor (see pictures below). We are going to attach these pieces to the back right of the bicycle. The motor will be placed on top of these metal pieces and we are going to add a second belt to increase power. We realized that we will not be generating enough power with just the one belt. We are also considering gearing our bicycle to increase the power. When we are pedaling, we only generate about 8 amps and the motor can reach 95 amps so we are not using the motor to its full potential.

We are doing more research today to find the block of aluminum that we need. The motor is about 6'' in length so we are looking for a piece that is at max 8''. We are still looking for parts for the converter that we need to build as well. Get to work team! Update: We might use metal found in the scrap bin in the classroom. This should work very well.  

We are continuing to work on our project. We are still designing the part we need on SolidWorks and will begin making adjustments to the exercise bicycle to fit the requirements that we need. Below are some pictures of our progress on the bicycle generator!  

Today, we organized everything that we are using for our project. We examined the treadmill and brought anything that we did not need to the dumpster in the back of the school. Everything is now neatly organized in a bin under the table. We also made the motor on SolidWorks and included the aluminum base that we need. We made very specific dimensions. Keep up the awesome work team!  

We are currently looking for a converter. With the power that we need to generate from the motor, we might have to make something ourselves. We will still being searching for one just in case. Also, we decided that we are going to build an aluminum base to hold the motor next to the bicycle. We still need to decide how we are going to place the aluminum and the dimensions we plan on using.