Electricity, and how do you make it.

[neuk]

I was thinking about how you would make power in the Twilight world.

The easiest way I could think of would be getting a car alternator and attaching it to some thing. This is based on most families having at least 1 car maybe 2. They cannot all be wrecked, and fuel is a thing of the past for most people.

Wind, a wind turbine could be made simple for any village. Attach the alternator with a belt drive system

Water, water wheel is a steady provider of power which hopefully would always be there. This could also be used to power other tools at the same time. Attach the alternator with a wheel held there by gravity?

The question I have is would 24v (car power source) be useful enough to power anything?

[headquarters]

In Bosnia they hooked little paddle wheels in rivers and streams up to dynamos to run small appliances on during the war .

They ran lighting , televisions and vcrs and radio etc on it . Not reliable -and not fancy -but they could charge batteries and see movies from: America - very good country yes

Originally Posted by neuk

I was thinking about how you would make power in the Twilight world.

The easiest way I could think of would be getting a car alternator and attaching it to some thing. This is based on most families having at least 1 car maybe 2. They cannot all be wrecked, and fuel is a thing of the past for most people.

Wind, a wind turbine could be made simple for any village. Attach the alternator with a belt drive system

Water, water wheel is a steady provider of power which hopefully would always be there. This could also be used to power other tools at the same time. Attach the alternator with a wheel held there by gravity?

The question I have is would 24v (car power source) be useful enough to power anything?

[Webstral]

Spin a magnet past a metal coil, and you have electricity. In some ways, Twilight: 2000 is an engineer's dream world because cost effectiveness takes on a radically different meaning after the breakdown of the centralized system. For some applications, electricity is so critical that many ideas that today would be cost-ineffective (and/or ethically dubious) can be tried.

Webstral

[jester]

Take those whom you defeat in battle and put them in a giant spinning wheel like a hampster, and make them run ta spin the generator! That'll give you power!

Or, there is always bike power like Gilligans Island!

[Webstral]

Originally Posted by jester

Take those whom you defeat in battle and put them in a giant spinning wheel like a hampster, and make them run ta spin the generator! That'll give you power!

Or, there is always bike power like Gilligans Island!

The bottom rung for EPW and criminals in SAMAD is the bike line. Prisoners are fed a given number of calories based on electricity generated by pedaling stationary bicycles. Don't pedal, don't eat. Very few last six months, although in fairness few are sentenced to more than sixty days on the bicycles at any one time.

Actually, the very bottom rung is voluntary euthanasia. A number of people consigned to the bicycles choose this route.

Webstral

[jester]

Originally Posted by Webstral

The bottom rung for EPW and criminals in SAMAD is the bike line. Prisoners are fed a given number of calories based on electricity generated by pedaling stationary bicycles. Don't pedal, don't eat. Very few last six months, although in fairness few are sentenced to more than sixty days on the bicycles at any one time.

Actually, the very bottom rung is voluntary euthanasia. A number of people consigned to the bicycles choose this route.

Webstral

Taking the cowards way out, the uh, cowards!

[headquarters]

Originally Posted by Webstral

The bottom rung for EPW and criminals in SAMAD is the bike line. Prisoners are fed a given number of calories based on electricity generated by pedaling stationary bicycles. Don't pedal, don't eat. Very few last six months, although in fairness few are sentenced to more than sixty days on the bicycles at any one time.

Actually, the very bottom rung is voluntary euthanasia. A number of people consigned to the bicycles choose this route.

Webstral

I am assuming the wheels have been removed..

Not spectator friendly Web.

Isnt there a "Circle of Blood" where sharp objects are randomly dropping into the cage for the people locked in there to use against eachother in front of stands with hundreds of howling fans chewing on spiced grilled rat on a stick ?

[General Pain]

Originally Posted by webstral

spin a magnet past a metal coil, and you have electricity. In some ways, twilight: 2000 is an engineer's dream world because cost effectiveness takes on a radically different meaning after the breakdown of the centralized system. For some applications, electricity is so critical that many ideas that today would be cost-ineffective (and/or ethically dubious) can be tried.

Webstral

go slaverism!!!

[avantman42]

Originally Posted by neuk

The question I have is would 24v (car power source) be useful enough to power anything?

Civilian cars (at least here in the UK) tend to be 12V. Lorries & military vehicles are usually 24V.

To answer the question, though: many things could be run on 12V or 24V, but may need some slight modifications. Most small electrical equipment drops the mains supply voltage down to 12V or less, and turns the AC supply to DC. So, to run a radio, for example, you'd need to make a way to connect the 12V supply to the low-voltage output of the radio's internal power supply.

Dropping the supply voltage down to the required voltage is easy - a resistor wired in series will do the job, though it'll need to be quite hefty and won't be very efficient.

Note that anything that uses a cathode ray tube (like a TV) requires a higher voltage - the power supply in a typical TV would have one outputs of around 100V and other low-voltage outputs, say 5-12V.

I don't know much about white goods like fridges, but I suspect they'd need something close to the normal mains supply to function. It may be possible (but not particularly easy in a T2K setting) to step up a 12-24V AC supply to 120/230V.

[jester]

They do have a power converter that allows one to switch from AC to DC, and adjust from 12 to 24 volt as well. These items would be found at boating and RV stores where one can find all maner of appliances designed for those types of craft. I personaly would go with items from the boat stores as they tend to be more weatherproof and durable although a bit more pricey.

[avantman42]

Originally Posted by jester

They do have a power converter that allows one to switch from AC to DC, and adjust from 12 to 24 volt as well. These items would be found at boating and RV stores where one can find all maner of appliances designed for those types of craft. I personaly would go with items from the boat stores as they tend to be more weatherproof and durable although a bit more pricey.

In today's world, it's pretty simple to convert AC to DC and vice-versa, but in the T2K post-EMP world, I suspect it'd be more difficult, especially as the boat stores are likely to have been looted.

It's a bit more difficult (bit still entirely possible) to convert a DC voltage to a higher voltage. With AC you just need a transformer, with DC you need some fancy electronics (years ago, I saw a circuit to convert a 9V supply to 200V), but again, I suspect it'd be much more difficult in the T2K world.

[Cdnwolf]

Went to Casino Windsor today and along the route all I saw was fields of wind turbines and was amazed at how many there were.

[Olefin]

Well there are lots of ways

1) Use water power - many old mill towns are built by running water because they used the water to power their machines. And there are lots of hydroelectric dams in this country. My own home town has an emergency source of power that is basically water drive that can be used to keep the power on if anything happened to the main power lines - was still maintained and able to be used until a few years ago - in Twilight 2000 they would have still had it

2) solar - there were lots of places, especially out west, that by the mid 90's were using solar panels to generate power - they would continue to do so in a Twilight 2000 situation - you could see a run on them after the Soviet China war started by survivalists who were getting ready for the end - and also by government agencies as back up power

3) coal fired powerhouses - especially in PA, WV and KY - lots of coal and in many places just about next door to the electrical generators - and not all of them would have been hit by EMP - especially considering almost no nukes set off near them -

4) Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome - "Bartertown runneth on pig shit" - have a feeling someone is going to remember just how much power you can get out of methane from animals from that movie - and its makes so much nice fuel as well

5) wind power - I remember the commercials back in the 80's and 90's for backyard windmills that could generate enough power to run your house and sell some back to the power company - EMP wouldnt do squat to them - willing to bet New America and other fun survivalist groups would have bought as many as they could before the Thanksgiving Massacre

6) Nuclear power stations - like the one MilGov has going near Colorado Springs - and you know that some of them would have successfully shut down and then restarted after the Massacre - sorry but not every station in the US is on line all the time - and there are lots of them in places that didnt get hit

Three Mile Island for instance - not even close to any nukes - closest ones were either near Hagerstown (the Camp David and Frederick nukes), DC, or Philly - all way too far for EMP effects to have damaged it - and they could have taken components from the shut down power unit to fix any damage to the one that works - and I am betting the governor (who has troops to keep order in the Harrisburg area according to Allegheny Rising) would have made damn sure that place stayed safe and unlooted