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Registered Member #75
Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 09:30AM
Location: Montana, USA
Posts: 711
This comes from the Free Energy LED topic, but I think it deserves it's own thread. Basically it's the off-the-shelf "Low Temperature Differential" Stirling engine that runs from the heat of a palm or a cup of coffee, mated to a small generator which is a brushless DC motor run in reverse. Since there is not a lot of Carnot efficiency between 270K and 300K, maybe 10% or so, and I wont move a lot of heat, a few Watts at best, I am hoping for a few mW of electrical output at best. Hopefully sufficient to run an LED off the waste heat of a CRT monitor or a computer though!
Construction goes something like this:
There is a displacer piston (the white foam) that moves air between a hot and a cold aluminium plate. The energy from the expanding air drives a work piston
which is going to sit in the blue cylinder on the far left. This drives the flywheel, which in turn power both the generator and the displacer piston. I just need to build all the small parts, connecting rods, seals and that stuff now. I was originally hoping to use NIB magnets dunked in Ferrofluid for the moving seals, but since the construction is all aluminium, this would give a lot of eddy current losses. Back to the drawing-board, I guess...
Registered Member #511
Joined: Sat Feb 10 2007, 11:36AM
Location: Somerset UK
Posts: 55
I like your stirling engine, I have seen similar ones on TV. With such low power I would think that friction would be your bigest problem. Instead of a piston and piston ring you could use a diaphragm but you will still need some sort of seal on the rod for the displacer.
Registered Member #75
Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 09:30AM
Location: Montana, USA
Posts: 711
Oh so very pretty! I want to build a tiny one too. I don't think they could provide much output power though, especially not when run off the heat of a hand. Usually they are build very carefully with glass-graphite seals for extremely low friction, and very low tolerances.
I think that some of the less sophisticated Stirling engines run without seals, as Ozzy said a diaphragm can also be used. The ones in the videos definitely have moving seals though, and I think that's much more 1337, so it's what I'll have to do
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LTD Stirling Engine
