[HN Gopher] Show HN: PedalPC - Generate electricity and get exer...
___________________________________________________________________
Show HN: PedalPC - Generate electricity and get exercise while you
work
Author : watchdogtimer
Score : 21 points
Date : 2023-05-16 10:30 UTC (12 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.pedalpc.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.pedalpc.com)
| watchdogtimer wrote:
| Hi HN,
|
| The PedalPC is a computer desk with a built-in, pedal-powered
| generator. It helps keep you fit by making useful, moderate
| physical activity an integral part of your workday. It also
| provides you with a clean, reliable, and dependable off-grid
| source of electricity that you can set up anywhere.
|
| I built it because I wanted some way to get exercise while I
| worked, but didn't want the energy I expended go to waste. I
| didn't see anything on the market, so I built my own. I've
| redesigned and rebuilt it several times over the years to arrive
| at what's shown here.
|
| I've been working on this as a side project since 2010. I'd
| appreciate some feedback on it before developing it further.
|
| The amount of electricity you can generate depends on your age,
| physical health, and how much you pedal each day. I'm 58 and
| produce around 220-240 Whr a day pedaling 3-4 hours per day. The
| PedalPC's maximum designed power output is 100 W. I typically
| generate about 60 W.
|
| That may not sound like much, but it's enough to power my
| computer, monitor, printer, desk lamp, and a cooling fan. It also
| recharges our phones and battery-powered LED lights we use around
| our home for nighttime illumination. It also powers our router
| and fiber network terminator to give us 24/7 broadband internet
| and wifi.
|
| The desk uses an e-bike direct-drive mini hub motor as the
| generator. It's driven by a toothed belt to minimize noise. The
| generator charges a 12 V LiFePO4 battery to smooth out the
| generator's variable output and store any excess energy generated
| for use when you're not pedaling.
|
| The desk has four 12 V DC power sockets and four pairs of USB
| power sockets. You can view the power consumption of each power
| socket and turn each one on or off from a dashboard in your web
| browser. Each 12 V socket also has PWM control, for varying
| things like cooling fan speed or beverage cup heater wattage.
|
| The dashboard is served from a small web server built into the
| desk. You can use it to host any other content you want, like a
| blog, wiki, small Fediverse instance, etc. (I use mine to host
| this project's web site.) You can also use it for a DNS server
| (e.g. pihole instance), file backup server, etc. Of course,
| you'll need to pedal enough each day to keep the server running!
| My dream would be to develop a network of desks like this, with
| each user hosting and powering their own content.
|
| I have built similar machines for two software developers in our
| town. One was mostly identical to the one shown here, with a
| built-in desktop. He uses it with his laptop. The other was built
| without a desktop, so he could use it with his existing standing
| desk. He uses his to charge batteries, power banks, and phones
| while he works. Both seem quite happy with them.
|
| Future plans are for a version made specifically for standing
| desks, better documentation, and an API to make it easier to
| integrate with things like Home Assistant, NextCloud, fitness
| loggers, or your own personal dashboard.
|
| Would you like a desk like this? (If so, please sign up for the
| newsletter in the footer on my site :) ). If not, what would you
| like to see instead? Any advice you may have is welcome. Thanks.
| O1111OOO wrote:
| Hi an issue with your RSS (xml):
|
| If I'm on your site's main blog page :
| https://www.pedalpc.com/blog/ : and I click on an article, it
| will correctly display with the following URL :
| https://www.pedalpc.com/blog/how-much-electricity-can-human-...
|
| If I click the same article via the generated RSS I get a 404
| because the URL is : https://www.pedalpc.com/PedalPC News/how-
| much-electricity-can-human-generate-per-day/
|
| Note: /blog/ ..VS.. /PedalPC News/
| watchdogtimer wrote:
| Thanks for letting me know. I've fixed the URL, but now I
| noticed the date template tag is not being populated :(.
| jononor wrote:
| Good job, hats off to you! I had the same idea some years back,
| and again during covid when I would o longer bike to work. As an
| old time bike mechanic and electronics engineer, I did some
| concept sketches but never ended up building it. You did and it
| looks good. Both the sturdy frame, the adjustments ability for
| seat and "handlebars", and the motor drive and electronics also
| look practical.
|
| For me personally I would miss the desk space - I really like to
| have ample space to put keyboard, paper notes, electronics etc
| on. How would one use this with a regular desk? Have you tried
| it?
| watchdogtimer wrote:
| Frankly, I've grown to miss it too--especially when I'm doing
| breadboard development and need more space. I'm currently
| building one to be used with a standing desk (a regular desk is
| too low--your knees will hit the underside).
| mmsnberbar66 wrote:
| This is really interesting and I would like to follow
| development.
|
| Unless I decide to live truly off grid, I guess I would not use
| this 8h/day, maybe 2h on average and otherwise continue to use a
| regular on-grid setup (which itself is already a variation of
| sitting, standing, and treadmill).
|
| Do you imagine the "switching" between setups to be made simpler?
| watchdogtimer wrote:
| That's a good question.
|
| The simplest solution would be to plug your equipment into USB
| and AC power strips, then switch the power strip cords whenever
| you want to change setups.
|
| The problem with doing this is:
|
| 1) You lose the ability to individually monitor the power
| consumption of each device, and
|
| 2) You'd have to use an AC inverter to power your non-USB-
| powered (e.g. your laptop or monitor). Using an inverter wastes
| a lot of energy, because you're converting from DC to AC back
| to DC. The more energy you waste, the less you have available
| to power your equipment.
| nitish1998 wrote:
| Amazing idea
| gabrielsroka wrote:
| This is fantastic! The first thing I thought of was this old
| Woody Allen film:
|
| https://youtu.be/Zhl-AHUS-f4
|
| The second thing was this graph by Doug Malewicki:
|
| https://www.oocities.org/mdetting/sports/hupgraph.gif
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2023-05-16 23:02 UTC)