Asia-Pacific News
Taiwan students invent power-generating motorcycle helmet
Jun 5, 2009, 12:32 GMT
Taipei - Three Taiwan university students have invented a motorcycle helmet that can generate electricity and power a scooter's lights.
Cheng Shiu University outside the south-western city of Kaohsiung announced the invention Friday, saying it plans to find a factory to mass-produce the helmets.
The students fixed five tiny fans that are also generators onto the front of the helmet so that when the motorcycle starts running, wind blow the fans and the fans produce electricity, said Professor Chen Feng-shih, who supervised the invention.
Through a Bluetooth wireless transmitter, the power is sent to the motorbike to power the scooter's front and back lights, brake light and direction indicators.
It can also power a pair of direction indicator and brake lights on the back of the helmet.
Four batteries, embedded into the helmet, can store the electricity generated by the fans.
The cost of all the gadgets cost 1,000 Taiwan dollars (30 US dollars), which does not include the cost of the helmet.
'The students are still trying to improve the invention by cutting the size and weight of the fans and using smaller batteries or doing away with the batteries,' Chen said.
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Older Talkback
page: 1
www.bikesafer.com has more on helmet lights in the conspicuity page....
since i'm a PTW blogger, i was interested in the akuma helmets - it sounds as if this is really useful technology.
unfortunately, however, akuma's take on it doesn't appear to be the same as what this blog entry is talking about at all: the 'IPS' powersources -- which power small LED-based lights of their proprietary design, internal to the helmet, NOT on the scooter -- are unshown and no details are given as to the nature of the power source. it could be drycell batteries, 'wetcell' batteries, wind turbines, even kinetic-based. there's no telling what you're paying for.
not only that: akuma's products are small helmet lights, which you can buy independently already. it's not even close to what this article is talking about, which is repurposing 'waste' energy to power some of the non-motive features of the vehicle. it's synergetic and considerably more advanced than sticking some LED lights on your helmet.
i hope this concept can be extended to other non-motive systems, like stereos, CDIs, et c. - i could use a wind-charged ipod recharger on my bike ASAP.
$32 Electric Powered Wheelchairs at www.lowcostwheelchairs.blogspot.com
Huh?
first off, you're not talking 'waste energy'. Assuming you're using the wind from the bike, the turbines will cause aerodynamic drag. Thanks to the 1st law of thermodynamics, we know that the drag will be more than the power generated by the system (due to parasitic losses, friction, etc.) The path the energy travels is more convoluted than an alternator attatched directly to the engine (engine->powertrain->wind->turbine->alternator->batteries->random magic (I'll address this in a minute)->lights vs. engine->alternator->batteries->lights) each time you convert energy you lose a little bit.
then there's the power over bluetooth issue. To paraphrase Morbo, 'BLUETOOTH DOES NOT WORK THAT WAY' while in theory you can induce some power out of radio signals, we're talking milliamps at best here... not enough for even the most efficient lights to power a backlighting LED, much less something like a headlight.
so um, I'm going to remain skeptical about this for now...
Neck strain !
At 100 km/h, that's 28 meters per second.
1 Joule of energy is 1 Newton x 1 meter
1 Watt is 1 Joule per second
1 Watt is 1 Newton x 1 meter per second
So 28 Watts at 28 meters per second exerts a force of 1 Newton
=100grams.
10% efficiency would give a drag of a kilogram on the rider's head for 28 Watts.
An alternator or dynamo should be more efficient anyway !
page: 1
Akuma HelmetsJun 5th, 2009 - 18:16:02
Dear M&C,
Akuma Helmets, www.akumahelmets.com, already has patented this system and is actively selling the product worldwide.
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