Piezoelectric Magnet Fanner Generator

[Blainiac]

It's been a long time since I've been on here.  I had an idea that combines the magnetic fanner concept with piezoelectric generators sandwiched between the fanner plates to generate electricity.


Example:  Imagine you have ten ferrite (non-conductive and magnetic) plates with nine piezoelectric generators glued between them.  This should make a nice cube stack with a bunch of wires hanging out.  Now, we repeat this process to make a lot of stacks arranged in a circular pattern.  Depending on the size and dimensions, we could have lots piezoelectric generators.


Now, if you remember the fanner concept, when a stack of magnetic plates/washers are introduced to a magnetic field, they will want to separate and 'fan out' the width of the magnet.  Now, since our plates are glued to the ceramic piezoelectric generators, they are not allowed to slide, but will still produce strain on the ceramic generators as the plates try to separate.  Fanner experiments done by Butch Lafonte show that once the plates are separated, it is harder for the magnet to 'leave' the plates, so that acts kind of a sticky spot.  The plates barely move (microscopically) in this case, so the magnets should move from one stack to the next without sticking or cogging.

If we have magnets rotating around in a circle, we can possibly generate enough electricity (stored in a capacitor/battery?) to exceed the input required to rotate the magnets.

What do you guys think?  Any variation (pendulums, tracks, etc.) of this should be easy and cheap (to test a small portion) to build.  Does anyone have the means to test it out?  One of the more interesting aspects would be to test how much more energy it takes to leave the stack than it gains by entering.  I don't think it would be too much as the plates don't move much.

Also, I think there's a similar piezoelectric design just a few threads below mine.  It doesn't use the fanner effect, but I haven't looked enough into it to see if it's kind of the same.

[lumen]

I had a similar idea but then reasoned that if the piezo crystals would work with such a small deflection then why include all the loss of the magnetic material when you could simply attach a small magnet to each piezo generator and rotate them by other magnets to generate power.
So I bought 50 piezo disks and the tiny magnets and 50 tiny full wave rectifiers but never yet put it together though I did do some testing of the piezo disks charging capacitors.

I figured that at some RPM the piezo disks would resonate at their base frequency and there would be a large increase in output.

The final design consisted of stacks of piezo disks on a rotor with the small magnets on each disk repelling the the next disk in the stack.
A stack of repelling magnets would provide the same effect as a fanner but not the increased drag.

Just passing along some thoughts on a similar concept.
Good luck!

[Blainiac]

Lumen,


Very interesting thoughts.  I was hoping that the minuscule change in separation would create a similar minuscule fanner 'drag', but simply attaching magnets to the piezoelectric generators might be a better way to go.  I think the idea of the peizos resonating at some RPM is interesting idea as well.  Is the concept you're describing similar to the drawing below?  In the drawing, I have a rotor with 6 arc magnets that is free to rotate about a shaft.  The stator consists of piezoelectric generators on the outermost region, with smaller arc magnets attached and near the rotor.

[lumen]

That would work but might cause some work to rotate from the tiny deflection of the magnets on the Piezo generators. Something like tires rolling, hard tires don't compress much and roll easy but with less air roll a bit harder because it's like climbing a tiny hill all the time.

I thought stick with the fanner effect but a bit different.

In the picture, when the rotor magnet passes a stack of piezo disks as shown, the red gaps between the disk magnets will expand because the compression field of the rotor magnet is also red, at the same time the blue gap will collapse because the field is pulled and weakened by the rotors red face.
The rotor magnets would be setup to alternate poles so the next magnet would collapse the red and expand the blue gaps.

The outer two stationary magnets frame the entire exposure range so to the rotor magnet nothing changes and there is no change in drag but yet movement is flexing the piezo disks and generating power.

Each disk need it's own full wave bridge to collect power so there is no interference in polarity between disks.

That was the final concept on the piezo generator that might have the best chance of working if it could be built clean enough.

[Blainiac]

I see the expansion and compression of the field you're talking about, very interesting.  One thing I wonder is if the outer stationary magnets do frame the entire exposure range, or if the compression/expansion of the field in that range affects the stationary magnets' fields so the rotor can 'feel' it.  I think in reality that the rotor should just come into and out of the stator stack just fine since the outer stationary magnets are arranged to equal out (look equal to the rotor on both sides).  I really like your idea of using a purely magnetic version and being able to prevent the drag on the rotor, really smart.

I wish there was a way to build this at the moment, I think your idea is really a great direction.  I know you mentioned this was the final concept design, but were you able to test any portion of it?  I think it would be a great build test!  I'll try to do some actual FEMM animations to see how the rotor magnet is affected coming into and out of the stator arrangement.  Awesome work Lumen...  you are definitely on to something!  Do you still have those piezos and magnets laying around?   


Update:  I've attached a 360 loop version to see how the field looks (relative to the rotor so I can see the field or any cogging).  It looks very smooth!  In this animation, you can't see the movable stator magnets moving in response to the field (the ones attached to the piezos) to properly see any true distortions in the field, but I think it's safe to say that the stators would keep the field in check.  It is interesting to see (without gaps).  Any thoughts?


ANIMATION!  DEFINITELY CHECK THIS OUT:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2AQ8-v73dnubWx3ZWpIanRjUWM/view?usp=sharing