Alternative Energy Forums

I keep looking but never seen anyone talk about how to convert the lifting and lowering of a weight into electricity. Maybe its too far out but humour me, If I move a weight of say 10lb over a vertical distance of 5 ft can we calculate the energy in watts. Do you have to go into newtons first? I will split the millions with you.lol!

I thought about converting the force into rotary motion then into an alternator, not even sure if that is possible but that's why I thought I would write here. Those wave machines at the bottom of the seabed are another possible design. You could move the magnet which is the weight, all ideas anyway- I hope its enough to get you thinking.

Enviroman101

I've priced voice coil linear generators and they are far too expensive for what little force they can produce.

Last Christmas Day the BBC news did a segment on exercise equipment used to generate electricity. It finished with some serious body builders saying that it has to be possible to generate electricity with weights or resistance, but probably isn't practical. It took it as a challenge.

I am using a rowing machine hooked up to a generator. It won't produce extreme muscle hypertrophy the way weights will, but it won't leave you looking bulemic like aerobic machines can do. Besides it is very efficient for workouts because several sets of muscles are exercised simultaneously. However until I can add a serious flywheel to it is less efficient at generating electricity than a bicycle.

With the price of oil new inflation adjusted lows and the fact that gym membership plummeted during the last depression, don't count on making any money from this concept. Though there may a way that I'm keeping to myself for now.

mikegrace3

I see two ways to do weightlifting power generation:

One is by converting the up and down motion to circular motion (similar to a rail hand cart) and hooking it up to an alternator with the size of the alternator or gearing providing the level of resistance.

The other is to use a hand water pump. The up and down motion can pump water up into a tank on top of a tower, then the water can be released and run through a micro-turbine to generate electricity. This would probably be best as the power "input" could be stored in the tank until enough usable power is created.

Either way, neither is a viable option for actual commercial electricity production. But if you're thinking green...

Weightlifting utilizes both concentric and eccentric motion, so there is no net energy output. You would have to convince weightlifters that concentric motion was the only important aspect of weight training to produce energy. From the water tank example, both actions up and down are concentric to the muscle groups that are producing energy. Thus water tank pump is not representative of actual weightlifting technique.

Current weightlifting dogma states that the best stimulation for muscle growth happens on the essentric action of weightlifting. This is called resistance training. Thus you would never get body builders into your gym because they focus on the essentric action.
For example: When you do a bicep curl, the concentric motion brings your
the work is done by the arm by this raising action, and the weight resists. The essentric motion is lowering your hand so your arm is straight at your side. During this phase the weight does the work by pushing your hand down and your arm resists. The weight just used it's stored potential by pushing down on the arm. Any energy that is siphoned off of this concentric/essentric action will do nothing more than reduce the performance of the fitness machine.