In-car mining rig - bad idea right?

[Cheshyr]

Necessary?  Entirely unnecessary.  Amusing though.

The irritating part would be lugging the mining rig back and forth between your car and your work/home each day.  After all, there's no good reason to leave mining equipment idle when you're not commuting.

Another angle on this...  even if we assume that the alternator usage doesn't increase fuel usage, we should probably take into account effort vs return.  At $0.15 per kWh, commuting an hour each way to work, assuming 120W power provided for free by the car, that's still only $12 a month in power savings.

So, yeah... mostly a for fun thing.  Unles you're a truck driver and you don't want to leave your mining equipment running at home while you're on the road.

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[AndersAA]

I think it's all been covered Thanks guys!

Pros:
Coolness factor

Cons:
There is no such thing as free power - something or someone always pays :-) Cruising RPM would simply be higher

And since someone asked: yeah - 3G/4G internet from my phone or a USB-4g-router.

I still might do it though :-)

[empoweoqwj]

Dunno - I hear about mining rigs setting on fire quite frequently, can you imagine the memes if a car exploded whilst mining dogecoin

[Kenshin]

I think a cool way to do it, is to put the rig in your work place. Hide it some where, then it will be free power. If your work find it, just don't admit it is yours. 

[Kenshin]

Dunno - I hear about mining rigs setting on fire quite frequently, can you imagine the memes if a car exploded whilst mining dogecoin

I know 3 GPUs of mine already caught on fire. Lucky it is under warranty. 

[MarketNeutral]

Is that blinking light an anti-theft device or a USB miner? Green...must be a miner.

[empoweoqwj]

Dunno - I hear about mining rigs setting on fire quite frequently, can you imagine the memes if a car exploded whilst mining dogecoin

I know 3 GPUs of mine already caught on fire. Lucky it is under warranty. 

And was that in your workplace? 

[krampus]

It's not like that at all - alternators turn freely, their output is related to RPM.

Under cruising RPM, your engine won't "work harder" to generate the power needed to run the miner, that power is already being wasted in the voltage reg/charge systems.  Miner is drawing from the battery, alt is providing variable charging amps to the battery/+ circuit while running.  Simple, keep the charge rate > discharge rate.  

Nope. That's not at all how alternators work. There's no "extra" power -- the voltage regulator found in every single alternator-equipped car is varying the excitation current in the brushes of the alternator in order to get a relatively constant charge at the battery terminals. The more load you draw, the harder the alternator will have to work to replace that load, all under control of the voltage regulator.

For instance, drag racers -- who are trying to eke out fractions of a second over their competitors -- use techniques such as electric water pumps and electric cooling fans that they can turn off for the duration of a run (less than 10 seconds, generally) and then turn back on again to cool down the engine once the run is complete. They don't do that for shits and giggles, they do it because it reduces the load on the engine, which allows them to deliver more power to the wheels.

(And in serious drag racing -- well above the hobby racer level -- I wouldn't be surprised if they did away with the alternator altogether and just used a battery).

[Maidak]

I'm just trying to figure out why it would be  necessary

semi drivers who are never home and want to play around with bitcoin mining hardware in their cabs ? While sitting at truck stops.

[nitehawk]

when do you have to be home to watch a bitcoin miner? I went on a work trip for over a month and didnt give my rig a 2nd thought ..

that aside wouldnt it just be cheaper to buy a generator and use fuel ?

[RickJamesBTC]

The more power you demand from the alternator the harder the engine works to turn it.

It's not like that at all - alternators turn freely, their output is related to RPM.  

Under cruising RPM, your engine won't "work harder" to generate the power needed to run the miner, that power is already being wasted in the voltage reg/charge systems.  Miner is drawing from the battery, alt is providing variable charging amps to the battery/+ circuit while running.  Simple, keep the charge rate > discharge rate.

Lights may dim because your 18" Subwoofing hasher is drawing high amps at stoplights, but it won't be noticeable at the pump.

I suppose if the miner is large enough - get a bigger alt, huge inverter, external charge controller, aux batteries, and a smaller pulley.

Picture this - ice road truckers running miners in their sleeper cabs for heat and extra BTC

You are COMPLETELY wrong. Look it up.

[xjack]

Whoops, wrong assumptions made by me.

Researched, error noted.  edited original post and stupidity quoted above for posterity.

[bcp19]

when do you have to be home to watch a bitcoin miner? I went on a work trip for over a month and didnt give my rig a 2nd thought ..

that aside wouldnt it just be cheaper to buy a generator and use fuel ?

I doubt a generator could provide power cheaper than the electric company.  I know this one company I worked at had to use a big deisel generator for a while and the cost was something like 5k a month rent and close to 20K a month in fuel.  Something like 700 gallons a week to provide 150KW/208V service 24/7.  That'd be enough to run ~120 KnC Jupiters at ~600 GH each or 72TH.  ~16.5BTC/day at current difficulty, but at a cost of ~1BTC per day.