Miners on gas or exercise?

[mikenekro]

So I have a few mining rigs and was thinking about ways to make them cheaper. I thought about using a generator or possibly a series of batteries with an alternator hooked up to something like a workout bike.

I'm not sure how difficult these would be to achieve but I know the workout bike would most likely require a lot of exercise (probably more than 1 person could do). Maybe if you owned a gym? Or thousands of hamsters on their wheels.

But for the gas generator, has anyone tried this or know if it would be cheaper to pay for gas to keep it running?

There's also a way of using wood gas to run the generator I think but that might take some time to "refill" or loss of power etc.

Basically I'm asking which method would seem more reasonable to power miners?

[MrTeal]

So I have a few mining rigs and was thinking about ways to make them cheaper. I thought about using a generator or possibly a series of batteries with an alternator hooked up to something like a workout bike.

I'm not sure how difficult these would be to achieve but I know the workout bike would most likely require a lot of exercise (probably more than 1 person could do). Maybe if you owned a gym? Or thousands of hamsters on their wheels.

But for the gas generator, has anyone tried this or know if it would be cheaper to pay for gas to keep it running?

There's also a way of using wood gas to run the generator I think but that might take some time to "refill" or loss of power etc.

Basically I'm asking which method would seem more reasonable to power miners?

Neither.

[mikenekro]

The generator wouldn't work? Why?

And yes I know it would require more then 1 person to build up the energy needed to charge the batteries. But I know you can charge batteries with exercise. Just depends on how much is needed.

You could have 12 batteries hooked up to your miners on one end and an alternator on the other end. Then the alternator converts the energy from let's say 20 stationary bikes to stored energy in the batteries. So the bikes don't power the miners directly, but are used to store energy in the batteries. Then you just advertise "free gym" haha

[MrTeal]

The generator wouldn't work? Why?

And yes I know it would require more then 1 person to build up the energy needed to charge the batteries. But I know you can charge batteries with exercise. Just depends on how much is needed.

Well, if you want to run a couple stick miners that would be fine. Look at the chart, a healthy human can provide 0.2HP (~150W) for a little less than three hours. If you wanted to something like a single Antminer S5 (~600W), you would need five people (~750W pedal power to get 600W electrical power) working together in three hour shifts to the point of exhaustion. That'd be 8 shifts a day, or 40 people if they can do the 3 hour shift every day.
At $300 and current difficulty, all that would produce $3.68 per day.

The gas generator would only work if you have free gas. I would guess even with free gas you might be underwater just with genset maintenance and repair if you're using a small ~1000-3000W model.

[mikenekro]

Ah ok I understand now.

You know anything about the wood gas method?

[mikenekro]

Well if I only had a few miners, some friends, exercise bikes, an alternator and a few batteries I could use it as a temporary power source to save some electricity.

Power the batteries to full charge, mine with it, exercise a bit to get some more hours, switch back to paid electricity, repeat.

It's something at least haha.

I may just try this for fun.
 Maybe get 4 or 5 100 amp hour car batteries for 4000-5000 kwh.

Just take a few regular bikes and take the wheels off, have the front sprocket about 10 times less teeth then the rear sprocket for speed.
Have that spin a homemade generator (basically magnets moving across some wire coils) and power the batteries.

Hook it up to an ant s3 for a while and see if I can get it to work.

[Snipe85]

First of all the generator will have an initial cost of purchase and then running and maintenance. Not many generators are fit for constant running, so a typical cheap stuff won't cut it you'll need an industrial or military grade gear. What is more a small generator with low wattage will be much less efficient than a big one, so buying it for a small mining farm is a waste of cash.
There are special kits that allow you to use propane as fuel. If you really have to use a generator buy this kit, it's much cheaper.

[Jamphone]

First of all the generator will have an initial cost of purchase and then running and maintenance. Not many generators are fit for constant running, so a typical cheap stuff won't cut it you'll need an industrial or military grade gear. What is more a small generator with low wattage will be much less efficient than a big one, so buying it for a small mining farm is a waste of cash.
There are special kits that allow you to use propane as fuel. If you really have to use a generator buy this kit, it's much cheaper.

Someone raised this on r/bitcoinmining not long ago. Someone else pointed out that there is an It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia where Charlie decides that "electricity is too expensive" and starts to power the bar with a generator, only to find out how much more expensive fuel is than electricity. The only country this plan would make sense is maybe Venezuela. And any sort of investment there doesn't make much sense.

[Kprawn]

The amount of fuel you would need to run the generator will offset the profit you would gain from it. {It will increase polution too} 

In my country gas and electricity costs are about the same price... so I do not even consider that. I have thought of wind and solar energy, but the cost to set it up, would also offset my chance to ROI.

We need something with very little "setup" cost and something that is friendly to the environment.   

[valkir]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVAZIDFMRXY

Pretty cheap.

Just plug it to a charger and charge a batterie. When its full use it to mine then when the battery get low, switch back to grid.

You will save some $ (really low) but hey if you do bicycle every day why not save some $ at the same time. 

[mikenekro]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVAZIDFMRXY

Pretty cheap.

Just plug it to a charger and charge a batterie. When its full use it to mine then when the battery get low, switch back to grid.

You will save some $ (really low) but hey if you do bicycle every day why not save some $ at the same time.  

This is what I am going to be doing. But making my own alternator and have a battery bank to store the electricity for later. You always have the grid for when you run out as well.

I think it's a good way to get in shape and stay in shape.

It's not terribly expensive. I have most of what I need. A bike, resin, etc.

The magnets are the most expensive. About $200 to get some bulky n52 grade neodymium magnets for greater power generation and then $60 for some copper wire for the coils.

The design I'm going off of produces about 1000 Watts an hour when on a wind turbine. So I'll see what it produces when you have a geared bike hooked up to it moving faster.

I can also hook up some blades to turn it into a wind turbine when not riding.

It can be hooked directly to the grid too and get some money off of your monthly bill. This way it has more uses to it.

[hedgy73]

You must be joking thinking you can run a miner from pedal power surely .

You would be dead before you made 0.01btc.

As for gas I don't know but I'm sure if it were possible it would've been done by now.

Better off sticking to whats known and that's cheap or free electricity and efficient miners.

[mikenekro]

You must be joking thinking you can run a miner from pedal power surely

As for gas I don't know but I'm sure if it were possible it would've been done by now.

Better off sticking to whats known and that's cheap or free electricity and efficient miners.

It's not just pedal power. Look up DIY 1000watt wind turbine.

Also it's not just purely from that. It's switching back and forth from home electric to alternator when the battery bank runs dry.

Have 5000 watt battery bank and you get 15 hours of free power from an S3 after charging.

Or it's running the alternator on your grid so it doesn't power the miner directly, but takes cash off of your monthly bill...

[mitus-2]

miners that takes energy from physical exercise? i don't think it's possible....you need a very big amount of energy, you cannot do it with a bike.
if you're interested in finding a way to mine some coin from physical activities you should check out Mangocoinz!

[mikenekro]

miners that takes energy from physical exercise? i don't think it's possible....you need a very big amount of energy, you cannot do it with a bike.
if you're interested in finding a way to mine some coin from physical activities you should check out Mangocoinz!

I'll show you guys what I mean when it's done... It's not running the miner directly from it.

It's storing power in a battery bank for later then switching back to your home electricity.

Or just chipping off cash from your monthly home electric bill.

[hedgy73]

miners that takes energy from physical exercise? i don't think it's possible....you need a very big amount of energy, you cannot do it with a bike.
if you're interested in finding a way to mine some coin from physical activities you should check out Mangocoinz!

I'll show you guys what I mean when it's done... It's not running the miner directly from it.

It's storing power in a battery bank for later then switching back to your home electricity.

Or just chipping off cash from your monthly home electric bill.

There's no way you can do this from pedal power it's impossible.

[mikenekro]

I did a bunch of research on homemade wind turbines the last few days. It's very much possible to run a miner off of previously stored energy in a battery through an inverter. If that energy just happens to be made from a person peddling a stationary bike it won't change the outcome. Just the energy source.

It's not meant to run it full time but as a secondary source.

Taking some big 4x2x1/2 neodymium n52 magnets and some 14 gauge enameled copper wire. Coil the wire, run magnets opposite polarity across the wire in a 3 phase configuration, you produce AC current.

Hook it up to a 3 phase rectifier then to a charge controller to a battery bank you get DC power stored in a battery.

Run the battery bank to an inverter to change back to AC current and you can use that to power any electronic. Just depends how long before you need the grid again.

Hook the inverter up to your breaker box correctly, you shed cash from your power bill. This might have to be done by an electrician if you do this.


If you think I'm saying, "yea I'm going to power a miner for days from this." That is not at all what I'm saying

It may take a week to build up enough power for 15 hours of mining. But that's still 15 hours off your power bill. Also some exercise.

Now if you hook blades up to the stator(diy alternator) you can turn it into a wind turbine in the off time and possibly get more.

[MrTeal]

I did a bunch of research on homemade wind turbines the last few days. It's very much possible to run a miner off of previously stored energy in a battery through an inverter. If that energy just happens to be made from a person peddling a stationary bike it won't change the outcome. Just the energy source.

It's not meant to run it full time but as a secondary source.

Taking some big 4x2x1/2 neodymium n52 magnets and some 14 gauge enameled copper wire. Coil the wire, run magnets opposite polarity across the wire in a 3 phase configuration, you produce AC current.

Hook it up to a 3 phase rectifier then to a charge controller to a battery bank you get DC power stored in a battery.

Run the battery bank to an inverter to change back to AC current and you can use that to power any electronic. Just depends how long before you need the grid again.

Hook the inverter up to your breaker box correctly, you shed cash from your power bill. This might have to be done by an electrician if you do this.


If you think I'm saying, "yea I'm going to power a miner for days from this." That is not at all what I'm saying

It may take a week to build up enough power for 15 hours of mining. But that's still 15 hours off your power bill. Also some exercise.

Now if you hook blades up to the stator(diy alternator) you can turn it into a wind turbine in the off time and possibly get more.

This really has nothing to do with miners specifically. You could say the same thing about just supplying some power to your home. They problem is that you'll likely never pay off the stuff you need to buy to do this.
Let's say you can produce 150W for two hours, every day. That's 0.3kWh of energy produced per day. Even if you're paying $0.20/kWh, that's $0.06/day in electricity produced. Even if you only spend $100 on your whole bicycle setup, it would take you almost 5 years of biking as hard as you can for two hours just to pay off that $100

[mikenekro]

I stated before that I am going to be doing it for fun after you pointed out that it would be not something to do for a profit. No ROI needed.

And when I do store up enough power to run my ant s3 for an hour or a few hours, I can call it a success. Even if it isn't the most profitable or reasonable way to get power, it will still be fun to do.

[valkir]

http://www.fitcoins.net/

Check this out!