My next project

[41south]

Ok - I now have a reasonable collection of hard drive mags. The picture below shows my proposed design of a small 3 phase alternator. The mags are 1/2 North and 1/2 South so I have designed the alt with 9 sets of mags per side (dual rotor) and 12 coils. The mag sets are every 40 degrees and the coils (the red rectangles) are every 30 degrees. The coils marked 1,2 and 3 are the first set to be cut by the mags as the rotor rotates anti-clockwise (as per the arrow). Have I got this anywhere near right?? Or should I just be looking at a single phase unit with this type of setup?? All comments (good and bad) welcome.

 

[MelTx]

  41SOUTH I think you are supposed to have 12 mags & 9 colis.Or a four to three ratio of mags to coils.I think windstuff has some more info in his posts.

                                                         Meltx

[kitno455]

nope, thats 5 phase. look at how each coil is in one of five different arrangements with the mags-

1. over the 'N'
   
2. over dead space
   
3. over 'N' and 'S'
   
4. over 'S' and a little 'N'
   
5. over 'S' and a little deadspace
   
   

this setup would work much better if you crack those mags in half, and space out the N/S poles.

that said, 5 phase will work just fine, just more (lower power) rectifiers required.

allan

[kitno455]

actually, now that i look at it again, its 4 phase. other comments still apply.

allan

[41south]

Thanks for the comments. The only other thing I could think of was single phase, 1 coil per mag N/S set.
I'll have a go at cracking a set in half. I saw something about scribing them first so I get a nice clean break line.

[hiker]

use a vise and a fine toothed hacksaw-just scribe the back side of them--then snap off with a pair of visegrips--should make for a nice clean break..

could use two pairs of plyers or visegrips if you dont have a vise..........later.