Introducing Our New Experimental AMTEK 30VDC Permanent Magnet Motor

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If you’re at all interested in experimenting with alternative energy, you’ve probably heard that if you take an electric motor and apply some kind of a force to it to spin the shaft, electricity will flow from its wires.

Most people who consider building a wind generator or some other form of electricity generating experiment think that a car alternator is the perfect type of motor for their projects. While car alternators can be used successfully, they’re probably not the most efficient type of motor for most applications. The reason for this is that an alternator needs to have electricity to generate electricity.

Sound confusing? Well it’s really not. You see, an alternator like you might find under the hood of your mini van requires 12v power which transforms the coils of wire inside the alternator into electromagnets. When the alternator pulley is spun at a certain speed, electricity is produced. The main thing to remember is that no 12v electricity going in = no electricity being generated.
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Advantages and Disadvantages of Geothermal Energy

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pros and cons of geothermal energyToday I’ll be writing about some of the pros and cons of geothermal energy so that people might have a better understanding of this interesting source of alternative energy.

I won’t get into the specifics about how geothermal energy works today but rather just present both the positive and negative impacts that this form of energy might have on our ecosystem and society.
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One Must Have Tool For Off The Grid Living!

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Digital MultimeterToday I feel inclined to talk in this brief post about the one tool that I don’t think anyone who is living off the grid should be without. The tool that I’m talking about is a digital multimeter. If you’re not familiar with this tool, let me take just a minute and tell you about it. A multimeter is a tool that is used to measure various aspects of electricity.

Let me give you a good example. I’m currently experimenting with different permanent magnet motors to see how much voltage they put out when I spin the shaft. I’m trying to pick a motor to use for my next project. Without a multimeter, there wouldn’t be any way of knowing how much voltage each motor produces at a particular RPM. Sure, some people might try and just attach a light bulb to the wires coming from the motors that they are testing and see if the motor lights the bulb when the shaft is spun but that won’t really tell you much.
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An Example of Ingenuity That Put Us On The Path Towards Living a Renewable Energy Lifestyle

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The path to living a renewable energy lifestyleOther than the fact that my husband and I were thoroughly exhausted with the fast paced lifestyle of living in the Salt Lake City area, one thing stands out to me that sort of pushed us in the direction that has led us to where we are today.

Several years ago, my husband sustained a traumatic brain injury that eventually resulted in him developing a seizure disorder. This was hard on all of us but it was especially hard on him. The fact that he was suffering from seizures that didn’t respond to anti-seizure medication meant that he could no longer drive. This may not seem like a big deal but it meant that he had lost his sense of independence which was a big part of who he was.

After the seizures started, he considered buying a bicycle to get around on. This led him to start investigating human powered vehicles. This is when he stared realizing how inefficient traditional upright bicycles were. His research led him down the path of leaning about recumbent bicycles and he ultimately decided that he would like to buy what was called a “recumbent tadpole trike”.
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How To Live Off The Grid Without Sacrificing Comfort

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rocking chairI’ve mentioned before that when we decided that we wanted to try our hand at off grid living how not being prepared almost made us give up. We jumped in head first without having the slightest clue what it was that we were getting ourselves into and this is a recipe for disaster no matter how you look at it.

I’m sure that our story is a common one. As a matter of fact, a couple of years ago, a really nice father and son couple bought a parcel of land right next to ours and showed up on the mountain with not much more than a little two wheel drive pickup truck, a motorcycle, and a pocket full of money. They, like many others, thought living off grid was just going to be a big adventure. We tried to help them by sharing the mistakes that we had made with them but no matter how hard we tried, they wouldn’t listen. They ended up blowing through all of their cash that summer and about five minutes after the first snowflake fell, they high tailed it back to Arizona and we haven’t seen nor heard from them since.
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