I was on my way home this afternoon and got curious about something. If you have a gadget that requires 12V of power... is there something you can stick on a bike to generate that power while riding? I know it would obviously attach to the tire, being that it moves... Is 12V a lot..? Im not a electrical major :-p

Thank you!

12 volts isn't much of a problem to generate; I'm not sure how much current you can produce without significantly slowing the bike. There are generators that rub the tire, most commonly to power lights, but Shimano used to make a generator hub that was a lot more efficient. Still, the bike has to be moving for it to work. You could of course supplement the generator with a small battery to solve this problem, although most portable devices can more easily be run from only a battery.

Well the device I am thinking about does not have a battery you can just put in... it has to be charged.. The battery life is about 1-2 hrs max... (not very good)...

I wonder if i was to use a reg battery, if there is an adapter the battery could be attached to that would be able to plug into my device..

Yes it can be done. It's not very practical. You can buy bike generators that charge cell phones. It's easier to remember to charge it at home. What do you want to charge?

Cycling down the road, you could easily put out, say, 50 Watts extra without too much trouble. Assuming this was 100% efficiently converted to 12V you would put out a little over 4 amps. Plenty to power a light or other small devices such as a battery charger.

Don't know where you can get such a converter hub though

(think this is right, it's been a while since my last EE class)

In 1969, my Schwinn stingray had a light that was powerd by a thing that rubbed the tire.

Made a cool sound.

I liked to pretend pretend it was a motorcycle engine.

G'day,

a few years ago a mate of mine, (who is a 'sparky' by trade), reckoned his kids watched to much TV/videos/dvd's etc & didn't get enough exercise. He rigged up the TV in the family room to a dynamo thingy on an exercise bike, so that in order to watch telly, someone had to pedal!...worked wonders too!....after the initial fascination wore off, the kids pretty much gave up watching telly & went & did other more productive stuff!

hitchy

Like watching TV at the houses of their friends?

hhaha i like the TV thing...!

Well I have a GPS PDA thing... My gf and I are riding the MS150 Houston-Austin... The people who made my GPS were slightly gimpy and decided not to allow you to put a rechargeable battery in the thing. Well the battery life, as mentioned earlier is not that long. I think it would be kinda cool to know where you are on the course as you ride (plus i like maps). That is why i am asking this. I dont know if i would actually be able to rig this thing up, but I thought it might be kinda a cool idea.

https://www.ikonglobal.com/