New alternator for the listeroid diesel engine
By DanB, Section Homebrewed Electricity Posted on Fri Oct 26th, 2007 at 02:14:11 PM MST
A dedicated battery charger for the Fuking Lister Clone

With my 20' wind turbine down I felt inspired to finish the project of building a direct drive battery charging alternator for the 'FuKing' Listeroid diesel engine.  For the last few years we've used it as a backup generator and it's been belted to a 5KW 3600 rpm WinCo alternator head.  There is a page about that here.  This arrangement worked pretty well - we could run the welder of the 240VAC end of the alternator, or charge batteries with the 120VAC.  Trouble is - it's just not that powerful.  To charge batteries I would run the output of the winco generator into my Trace 4048 inverter, which worked well - but over about 1.5KW it would slow the engine enough so that the inverter would reject the output of the generator - and -while charging everything was actually running off the generator, so if did so much as turn on the bandsaw (or any other large load) -it would slow the generator and the inverter would kick it off line.  So basically - if I had low batteries and charged with the generator we couldn't use much power at the same time. Last spring I installed an autotransformer so I could take 240VAC off my inverter, and I've learned that my well pump and my welder (the only things that need 240VAC around here) run much better off the inverter than they do off the generator.  So we decided to build an alternator for the listeroid that's dedicated to charging the batteries. The alternator is basically identical to the ones we build for 10' wind turbines.  Just like the steam engine project I turned out a wheel hub to fit the shaft of the engine. The magnet rotors are 12" diameter each with 12 2" dia x 1/2" thick N40 grade NdFeB magnets.  We banded them with stainless steel and cast vinyl ester around them. There is the engine with one magnet rotor mounted on the shaft. We built a 'stator bracket' out of angle iron that bolts to the engine where the fuel tank used to bolt on.  The stator has 9 coils, wired in star.  Each coil has 28 turns of wire - we wound with 4 strands of #15 gage wire. There it is all finished up! A veiw from the side... It pretty much works as I had expected.  650 rpm (the rated speed for this engine) gets us right at 2KW give or take a bit depending on battery voltage.  It gets a bit warm to the touch but certainly not anywhere near 'hot'.  It's very efficient.  It's also much easier to start the engine now that the belt is gone.  I'll leave the old generator on there and keep the belt for 'backup' but as it is now it's much more efficient and a much more practical generator. The 'otherpower.com' engine room..... (or at least it will be soon when we get a roof over it!)

New alternator for the listeroid diesel engine | 10 comments (10 topical, 0 editorial)

Re: New alternator for the listeroid diesel engine (3.00 / 0) (#1) by wooferhound (tim((NoSpamAt))wooferhound.com) on Fri Oct 26th, 2007 at 09:45:28 AM MST (User Info) http://wooferhound.com

Too Cool ! ! So, do you have enough to supply the neighbors power yet W o o f -={(

Re: New alternator for the listeroid diesel engine (3.00 / 0) (#2) by captndiet on Fri Oct 26th, 2007 at 10:55:22 AM MST (User Info)

Dan, I need the same set-up only in 24vdc. I sent you a PM. Jeff

Re: New alternator for the listeroid diesel engine (3.00 / 0) (#6) by DanB (danb@*no spam*otherpower.com) on Sat Oct 27th, 2007 at 11:18:48 AM MST (User Info) http://www.otherpower.com/

I have some ideas about this but think it'd be fun to hear some other thoughts.  Jeff wants about the same thing - but slightly more powerful (3KW @650 rpm or so) and he's needing that at 24V.  If we build the same thing for his at 24V, I'd be winding each coil with about 14 turns using 8 strands of #15 gage wire.   If we go a bit more powerful then things only get worse - if we stick with the 3 phase 'star' arrangment. I would be inclined to do something like this... (but there are lots of possibilities) 16" rotors with 16 of the same magnets on each one.  14 coils, 7 phase... each phase would consist of 2 coils in series and it'd be wired in Star.  I'd have to make a test coil - the coils would be smaller but Im guessing something like 10 turns/coil using 5 strands of #14 gage will come close although at the moment this is hurting my brain ;-) [ Parent ]

Re: New alternator for the listeroid diesel engine (3.00 / 0) (#7) by Flux on Sat Oct 27th, 2007 at 11:51:07 AM MST (User Info)

I take your word for it being 7 phase Dan. Probably work ok, virtually all these funny number things work when star connected. I think I would just use a 3 phase coil arrangement and do a Jerry and rectify each coil with a single phase bridge as he will need lots of those bridges or a monster bridge to handle the current. With the size of wire needed I don't think I would series connect any coils. Flux [ Parent ]

Re: New alternator for the listeroid diesel engine (3.00 / 0) (#3) by Ponderance on Fri Oct 26th, 2007 at 11:40:26 PM MST (User Info)

I had my friend over tonight, also a DIY guy, and was showing him around the site both fieldlines and otherpower and he showed specific interest in the listeroid and 12" alternator. he was wondering if the listeroid single could handle the 22" alternator from the 20'-er or would he be better off using a gen that was more common for the listeroid application? his application is powering both mercury vapor and florescent lights for a horse stall/ arena.

Re: New alternator for the listeroid diesel engine (3.00 / 0) (#4) by Flux on Sat Oct 27th, 2007 at 01:24:10 AM MST (User Info)

Don't forget that for other loads than battery charging, frequency matters. The 600rpm engine speed works out at 60 Hz with the 12 poles of this alternator. If you live in a 50Hz area then you can't use the full engine speed and still maintain 50Hz. The larger wind turbine alternators will come out at higher frequency so you will not be able to run standard magnetic ballasts on the lamps. Electronic fluorescent will be ok. You would also need to balance your load around the 3 phases reasonably closely to keep the full rating. With other than battery charging you need also to consider voltage regulation, speed is the only control you have over the voltage. You have to be close with your design to hit the correct volts ( you can play with the air gap a bit). The regulation on load is dependent on the alternator impedance and the engine governor speed droop. Probably good enough for lights as the ballast reactance corrects to some extent for the change in frequency. If you decide to scale it up you must stay at 12 poles for frequency dependent loads, power hand tools ,tungsten lights and heaters will not bother about frequency. Flux [ Parent ]

Re: New alternator for the listeroid diesel engine (3.00 / 0) (#5) by Ponderance on Sat Oct 27th, 2007 at 10:50:58 AM MST (User Info)

oh wow, you just answered about 6 different questions i had in mind to ask on another posting, thanks a mill, Flux! so magnet count and phase setup has everything to do with frequency harmonic cycles in AC. that covers about half of my concerns. sorry for post stealing, but i just wanted to ask a few questions off of this model. [ Parent ]

Re: New alternator for the listeroid diesel engine (3.00 / 0) (#8) by Shadow on Sat Oct 27th, 2007 at 07:16:23 PM MST (User Info)

Hmmm... So what  configuration would I need to stay at 60hz but go with 240 volt AC?

Re: New alternator for the listeroid diesel engine (3.00 / 0) (#9) by BigBreaker on Sun Oct 28th, 2007 at 08:21:56 AM MST (User Info)

More turns for the higher voltage. The frequency will be directly related to engine RPM and poles. [ Parent ]

Re: New alternator for the listeroid diesel engine (3.00 / 0) (#10) by TomW on Sun Oct 28th, 2007 at 02:24:37 PM MST (User Info)

Shadow; As already stated frequency will be dependent on pole count and RPM. Voltage "should" be a direct ratio with wraps at a given RPM. As in 100 wraps gives 120 volts then 200 wraps should produce 240 volts. In use there will be loading that will impact voltage but thats a moving target that the math may not be easy to do. As always your mileage may vary and close cover before striking. Cheers. TomW "Education consists mainly of what we have unlearned."--Mark Twain [ Parent ]

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