Power the micro-windmill from the speaker’s voice!

Researchers from Texas have developed a miniscule ‘micro-windmill’ that is just 1.8mm wide and can transform wind energy into electricity. The team behind the design claim hundreds of the nickel devices could be fitted to a phone case, for example, and users could charge their phone simply by waving it in the air.

Yep. Finally a way to capture salesmen’s hot air!

“Pardon me, young man, but can you blow my phone?”

http://www.uta.edu/news/releases/2014/01/microwindmill-rao-chiao.php

And my girl friend said I am full of bullshit.

"...a six pack and a dozen hard boiled eggs, you could mount a mini fan to my butt and I could power dragster"

To: Pocket Lint:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=jJI_dwzvztQ

someone should develop a little windwill charger that fits on the outside of a vehicle and spins , delivering charge , whenever the vehicle is being driven , recharging whatever is connected to it , within the vehicle

Maybe the beanie with propeller on top will come back into fashion?Would look real good on the pajama-boy types.

I love that commercial !! It is SOOOO annoying! When I go to the Gun Club and hear Union guys talking about Unions saving the world I scream “WHEE, WHEE, WHEE.” I sometimes get beat up, but who cares?

As opposed to the cigarette lighter chargers that run off the vehicles’ electrical system?.................

Hood ornament?

LOL you can’t call it that now.
It’s a “power port”

The wheels of a car are a generator (the static electricity can blow up a gas station.) Why hasn’t any geek harnessed that energy?

Why not two tin cans and some string?

So now one can turn on one’s phone by blowing it?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkcn8ZkvKKc&feature=player_detailpage

Please, document any incident in which static electricity from a car’s wheels has blown up a gas station.

Doesn’t that conveniently fit the homosexual agenda?

The Yellow Jacket, a cell phone case that doubles as a stun gun, is much cooler.

I was actually thinking of getting a decent hand crank charger for those times when trekking and hunting in back country for a few days at a time. Anyone have any good recommendations on one?

The wheels of a car are a generator (the static electricity can blow up a gas station.) Why hasn’t any geek harnessed that energy?

First, because it's very difficult to design an inverter that takes 20 kV DC in and produces 5V out. There are no semiconductors that can take that voltage. This is one of the reasons why DC is not as easy to work with as the AC. For the latter you only need a transformer.

Second, there isn't that much of energy to bother with. Say, the car to ground capacitance is 1000 pF, and the voltage is 20 kV (any more and it will leak out, through tires or through ions in the air.) Then:

u = 0.5 * 1nF * (20kV)^2 = 0.2J

0.2 joules is, by definition, 200 mA through 1 Ohm for 1 second. In other words, it generates 0.2 watts for one second. This is just enough to power a keyfob LED (20 mW) for ten seconds - something that a cheap coin battery does 100x more reliably and more efficiently.

Merely read the warnings at the gas pumps, read the warnings at the gas cans that say “Fill outside of the vehicle.” Call any gas station and ask them why these are there. Static electricity is a hazard to anyone filling a gas can in the car. Read and study a little bit. Hundreds of youtubes, I’d bet, on this.

cheap

http://www.amazon.com/American-Cross-CLIPRAY-Charger-Flashlight/dp/B003BYROUQ/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top

First, because it’s very difficult to design an inverter that takes 20 kV DC in and produces 5V out. There are no semiconductors that can take that voltage.....You seem knowladgible. Get to work. Ask for a grant.

The team behind the design claim hundreds of the nickel devices could be fitted to a phone case, for example, and users could charge their phone simply by waving it in the air

This isn't going to turn out well.

#ANNOYINGELECTRONICPACIFIER

No tech info so it is non meaningful…Best question is HOW UCH taxpayer went into this boondoggle??

Most of the static electricity is generated by the person sliding across the seat fabric. That’s why you should stay outside the car while filling-up. When you’re filling a gas can, place it on the ground so it will be grounded (esp. if it is a metal can). Plus, if you overfill the gas can, you don’t want it to be inside the vehicle.

Just wait until people start waving around their phones in movie theaters to charge them up.

LOL!! Now that is funny.

I can picture drivers doing this in the fast lane. Slowing down 5 miles per hour (as they typically do) to be “safe”.

Not arguing. I just don’t see grabbing the door handle, opening the trunk(or whatever) grabbing the gas can and and grabbing the pump nozzle as not discharging the static electricity from getting out of my seat (which I don’t have to slide across). Nor does anyone else have to slide across.

HA! You beat me. +1

I guess it’s just me.

I haven’t learned how to levitate myself yet.

We should make slightly larger versions of these, and mount them to the heads of every Democrat politician in office. All the hot air they emanate would keep them spinning all day long! Energy crisis solved.

How about using those beanie hats with the windmill?

Holding it out of the window driving down the road?

Sounds interesting, like the piezo-electric (?) chargers on flashlights - no need for batteries.

How many lawsuits will follow from people hearing a “buzzing noise” by being within a mile of the little wind turbine?

Imagine that they can be cheaply made

Paging Sir Paul McCartney; Sir Paul, please pick up the white phone!

wrong Beatle

All Beatles are the wrong Beatle.

When are they going to have a surgically implanted model like in Total Rekall 2?

Right; not that I cared for any of them...and I guess it shows.

I don’t remember that one (or didn’t see it).

Hogwash. Come on, just ONE example. Perhaps you are the one who should read and study before making bold claims about static electricity?