Bicycle power

There is a big resurgence at the moment for solar panels to generate some free power.  It’s certainly a great way to cut down on the cost of electricity, but these are expensive and require a specialised installation.  There are however several other options for producing your own power at home.  One of these is to use a generator that attaches to your bicycle.  You get to generate some power and get your daily exercise while you do it. These generators act like a stand where you mount the rear wheel of your bicycle and pedal away.  These generators can produce anywhere up to 400 watts but will require some accessories if you are to store this power for use later. Some versions of these generators are not recommended as they rely on a belt system that requires you to remove the rear wheel of the bicycle in order to set it up.  These cheaper generators are a real pain to setup and dismantle after use and are not recommended as they will discourage you.  

How do these generators work?

When the bicycle is on the generator stand the rear wheel will spin as you pedal, which in turn will spin a magnet on the generator that is contained within an electrical coil.  Due to electromagnetic properties, electricity is produced in the coil due to this spinning action.  That’s it; electricity is immediately generated as soon as you begin cycling.  

Storing power

While the generator itself will generate electrical power, that can be used immediately, it will be lost unless you attach a battery pack to the generator in order to store the created electricity.  If you were to just pedal with the generator only and plugged in a TV of computer you could do damage to these units by not maintaining a constant output of power.  Stop pedalling and your computer will lose power and instantly switch off.  If a computer is not turned off properly it can do a lot of damage.  

How practical are these generators?

Let’s say you cycle for 1 hour at half the capacity of the generator and produce 200 watts.  This means that you will produce 200 watt-hours.  A standard laptop uses 20 watts meaning that your 1 hour of pedalling could power your laptop for 10 hours. Now imagine there are 2 parents and 3 kids, all with their own bicycles and generators and enough battery packs to hold all of this power.  Potentially you could be storing up to 700 watt-hours of power.  This will mean very good savings on your electricity bills.