No new carb? No new more efficient alternator? No figuring out a custom programmed circuit to increase that 72% capacity to 99% or to use that excess capacity to charge and discharge a capacitor when necessary to prevent that bog down? No custom 3D printed gearbox to run a thingamabopper? No completely redesigned motor to create regenerative braking? No trying to get a golf cart up to highway speeds? I was sure by now you would have inspector gadgetted that thing to beat the Renault in a drag race! 😂 But seriously, love the channel. Thanks for the entertainment and knowledge. Your channel makes me feel like a kid excited to wake for Saturday morning cartoons.
Well he could set up a current sense for the electric motor, and when that drops to a low level, use the excess capability to charge a big honking capacitor (or a battery) out of circuit, up to its limited voltage. And then when the current sense on the motor exceeds a level, switch the big honking capacitor (or battery) into the circuit to provide more kick. Of course, it won't help efficiency any, but maybe it can do burnouts. :P
One of my smartest professors once told me that one test is worth a thousand expert opinions. I like your hands on approach and the quality of your videos. Well Done, Sir!
I actually put a 9” steel pulley as an extra flywheel on the predator 212 on my mini offroad tractor. It greatly smoothed power output and reduced the frequency of stalling when high loads were incurred at low RPM.
That would be my suggestion, some sort of one way like a sprag bearing to drive the flywheel shaft so it can speed faster than 3600 rpm and also coast a variator between the engine and flywheel so when under very little load the rpm can go up.
As always, Jimbo, excellent! On diesel electric locomotives , even they are only running 70% +/-. The newer GE/Wabtec locomotives are running a little better than that, I understand. If anyone could have discovered how to squeeze out better efficiency, the railroads would have found that by now. So, your fun and very entertaining project actually reveals the math behind the scenes that engineers have been dealing with for the past 80 or more years! Now, how cool is that? Lol! Just like engineers have to do, sometimes, because as the saying goes, it is what it is, and you just have to work with what you got. The fun part? Thinking outside the box and challenging oneself to come up with solutions for challenges. You do that part very well, my man! Might I add, with the best sense of dry humor this side of the pond . . . Lolololol! Looking forward to the next set of diabolical shenanigans. 😅
Thank you so much! I really appreciate that you understand the efficiency issue. Believe it or not I have to argue with folks when I tell them this system is inefficient.
Even though it’s inefficient, there’s reliability in simplicity. There’s a balance to be had. What good is a 100% efficient device that is not reliable? 50% of the time, it works everytime!
Electrical generation for the grid is a far bit more efficient, but that's using gigantic turbines in very well controlled environments. It's just not practical to reproduce that kind of thing on a smaller scale, even the size of a locomotive. It also requires a lot of maintenance to keep everything within tight tolerances.
There are a lot more efficient generators, what the problem is mostly the price, and probably the power density. Electric cars have about 60% regen efficiency, wich is battery -> inverter -> motor (accel)->motor (generator)->inverter -> battery. My point is that all those steps are all within the 40%, so 80-90% efficient generator/motor is achieved by EV-s. Heck even just adding syncronous rectifiers to this alternator will give it about 2-3% efficiency boost, by eliminating 1-1,2v wasted on the diodes.
@@robotcantina8957 The "rule of thumb" I've considered for years is that energy conversion from any type to another is around 50% efficient. So it's an ignorant public that thinks an EV is efficient. Like it or not, many power plants are still carbon driven so Original energy (say from natural gas) to electricity costs 50%. Then halve that from transmission losses so now at 25%. If it stopped there (and it doesn't, the EV itself has loss converting back to mechanical energy), then still wasted is the difference between running the Natural Gas in an Internal Combustion engine (nominally 35% efficient) and the (less than) 25% you've ended up with for your shiny expensive new EV. That says nothing of the massively increased load on the national electrical grid already barely managing demand OR the horrible waste of natural resources within the batteries and super-overweight components for the EV itself. Put another way, I won't be rushing out to buy an EV anytime soon.
Jimbo, I wanted to say thank you. I paused your video in the middle to go fire up my 212 minibike with ape hangers and take it for a spin. I've not had it out in probably a year and a half. It makes me want to build some other fun contraptions.
Thank you for this video! I wish I had a wand to promote this to millions more eyes. Which, I suppose is only 1/2 millions more people...anyway. I've been converting cars/tractors to electric for 10yrs and taking them to shows. I can't tell you how many times I get asked why I don't just, "put a alternater on a wheel so I don't need them bat-rees!" Why not just tow a second battery? When one dies, switch over to the second and charge the first while you drive, etc... My current project is an old VW pickup. The plan is to run a portable generator to power my onboard charger as I drive to extend my range. I don't need my range extended but I do need to find out how many mpg a Harbor Freight generator gets! Your experiment is probably the most inefficient method of cruising a golf cart and I love it! I can't wait to see what results I get. Great job!!
Gas generators like the small ~2-3kW size have terrible efficiency. I did a crappy test with a killawatt meter and calculated less than 30% from fuel to power.
In the early post-war Soviet Union there was a diesel-electric bus, the ZIS 154, that had a similar configuration as this golfcart. In comparison to regular busses, it had an obnoxiously high fuel consumption of 65L/100km. They also put gasoline engines in some of those busses, as there were problems with getting enough diesel engines from the seperate factory. Because that system turned out to be unreliable (fuel consumption wasn't that big a priority, but may still have played a role), the bus got replaced pretty quickly with the conventionally driven ZIS 155 with a now front placed gasoline engine. The SU was a big advocate for gasoline busses btw.
I love Duke's shot of you buzzing along on that thing in front and then dipping down to to speedometer reading north of twenty instead of ten. I feel like there was a concerned eyebrow raise when he saw that.
I totally understand the production time for videos. We used to do videos of our bus restoration and gave up since it was taking more time to produce videos than the actual work.
Now all you need is a wind splitter and a diffuser and a four foot tall spoiler for aerodynamics, and an attachment on the front to hook up horses since you're near Amish country
I've been an electrician for over twenty years now. In my teenage years, I was a small engine mechanic. And now I build grace engines outside of being an electrician. I find this very interesting!
The AFS Trinity used ultra capacitors about 20 years ago. I road in it. It accelerated like a Porsche Cayenne. It was a prototype based on a Saturn Vue SUV. It retained the front Saturn engine and had a custom rear differential with the electric motor. So yes, ultracapacitors can be used. You would have to figure out the circuitry. I'll bet some viewers could design a basic circuit for a 6 pack of ultracaps.
Thanks for loading up the engine until it stalled! I did something like this nearly 20 years ago and was shocked when I stalled the engine. I didn't know the math but I understood WTF happened.
I love your videos and the ingenuity that you put into them. They are both informative and enjoyable. Changing the pully ratio to a smaller pully on the engine would give you more torque on the alternator so that you could come up with more amps to keep it from stalling. You would however not be able to produce as many volts so it wouldn't go as fast. If however, you had a way to change the pully ration you may be able to solve both problems.
Thanks! Maximum watts that can be generated is 2900 if you include the loss in the system. Changing the pulley ratio still means the maximum wattage is 2900. Spinning the alternator fast with the overdrive pulleys we are using also improves efficiency.
He's calculating 3.9 hp out of the alternator. If the motor is 80% efficient that would be 3.1 hp to the road. Probably closer to 70% efficient so 2.7 hp. As you said, less than half. Diesel electric locomotives use a similar system. Their alternators and motors are more efficient but overall maybe 65% of the horsepower produced by the engine gets to the track.
An alternator is actually a brushless motor out of nature, if it were a DC motor or a "generator" like what cars from the 50s had, the power loss would be alot worse, it was rare to see more than 90 amps from a generator compared to 140 from a alternator
@@Rattus-Norvegicus He doesn’t even have seat belts yet🤣. How fast do you want it to go? Though I think at some point there will be a limit to how many amps the DC motor can handle. So let’s think about it. Suppose he put the 720 cc Kubota in there and increase the output by 4 fold. So now imagine he has 4 alternators and each of them is peaking at say 80 Amps. Each Alternator has a lead going to the motor, that’s 320 Amps. That 320 Amps is being delivered to a single contact on the DC motor……… The other thing is the DC motor may have an NGO RPM limit so . . . .. The other problem is weight. The motor sits behind the rear wheels, which is a bad place for a motor. As the weight behind the rear wheel increases understeer on the front wheels increases. When that occurs the weight distribution and road conditions determine how the vehicle steers.
@ Uh😎 where would you put the motor mounts, OUCH? Question, how much rotational torque, say in a crack shaft and flywheel, could you put on the axial center of gravity of a golf cart sufficient to flip it while moving at a moderate speed ?
I’m one of those people that cannot fathom why anyone would expend the energy to criticize what you are doing. Please keep doing! Looking forward to a V2 of the petroleum battery.
@tk429 a 4 wheel cart with better brakes would be a good idea if he was going to keep going faster. Those 3 wheels are unstable if they hit bumps at a angle. There's gotta be a front brake kit for these things with all the mods people do to them in places like Florida. Maybe front go cart disks
@@KR-hg8be Probably wouldn't be hard to hit up somebody like Go Power Sports and see what they have. I bet you could adapt a go cart disk or the rear disk for a mini bike to it. I 100% agree that a 3 wheeler like that would have to have hella bump steer. I wonder why nobody makes a trike golf cart with one wheel in the back and two up front like a quad. Hmmmm.......
The 30 mpg or more for golf cart is like a car manufacturers estimated MPGs. Is it possible? Yes, if you are rolling down a mountain with your engine off!
The reason ultracaps aren't used in electric vehicles is they don't have a high enough power density. And when the density improves on ultracaps, the chemistry has already improved on lithium batteries.
Good stuff Jim! I have my fingers crossed that you'll try installing the little diesel engine to see if it has more low end torque than the gasoline engine. I've been wondering if the 196cc diesel would be the better choice because of the torque curve needed to drive the alternator during the initial acceleration. Although the gasoline engine will provide more overall horsepower, the diesel engine may provide more low end torque than the gas engine, where you need it. (Also maybe anger a few mosquitoes)
The little diesel is a great engine for experiments, however that thing is NOISY and it shake violently. We want a quiet solution. Perhaps a Z482 kubota diese would be a better choice.
Thanks as always Jimbo for thinking up these experiments and giving us the technical details of why these contraptions do what they do. I find a perfect balance between fun and technical. Daz from Australia
The thing with the supercaps can be done, if you run the alternator field to keep a continuous voltage (as it would normally be in a car) and materialize a 150a PWM controller out of thin air - and hook up the supercaps between the alternator and the PWM driver power input. Such a powerful driver is not that common to find for cheap. But DIY can probably be done for
get a 48v lipo with a bank of capacitors I was thinking like the ones used in big power car amps that help prevent a voltage sag when the amp pulls a lot of power from the speakers hitting deep base
This setup would likely be more efficient, too. The only question would be whether the setup fits with the intention of the project. The batteries would essentially be replaced by a cap. I’d like to see this, though!
I tried for months to make my own PWM motor speed controller using mosfets and an Arduino, but I kept blowing stuff up. I was converting a pedal trike to electric with a 700 watt 36v motor. After the circuit failed and the motor went full power on me unexpectedly, I decided to buy a commercially available controller before I got myself hurt.
@@WarrenGarabrandt Making a motor controller is tricky. Unlike switching an LED, motors have a large inductance and produce a back EMF even when no power is applied. Motor controllers have sophisticated electronics with values that are carefully calculated to ensure it can handle the large peak currents and avoid shoot-through while switching. It's certainly not for the faint of heart, even if you have a background in electrical engineering.
Thank you for these videos. I have wondered how a generator connected to a motor would do and these videos got straight to the point. You do teach how things work also.
Really enjoyed this episode, Jimbo! 🏆👍🏼 Hey, three things: • as an under-trained Jack-of-all-Trades-Master-of-None, my “technical” assessment of the WOT Bog would’ve been “Rotational resistance of alternator may occasionally exceed available torque of petroleum battery”, and left it at that. I wouldn’t have given the technical explanation a moment’s consideration. However, I have to confess that, although I already understood what was happening, I really enjoyed your brief Electrical Engineering Explanation [abbreviated to EEE! 😬 in the Robot Cantina Study Guide]. I found the numbers interesting, atypical for a guy like me… I never knew BHP had an electrical analog. 🤔 • As an inmate in the Kommifornistan Prison Kamp, I would love-love-LOVE to see these Petroleum Battery Carts mass-produced and imported here, for no other reason than to stick-it to our slimy Diktovernor. Ol’ Grewsom would have a conniption! 😆 • I do realize that you don’t have much time to devote on Robot Cantina Merch, but I personally would love to purchase one of those metal “phone holders” featured in this week’s episode. Is that custom fabricated, or was it a repurposed item? Thanks for all you do, Sir!
LOL, California needs hybrid's like this. The phone holder thingy is a robot cantina exclusive. I 3D print them for all the "telephones" that we use for filming the video series.
@ Oh, that’s a print?! Great resolution, I mistook it for metal! Wish I could get prints like that out of MY printers. 😏 Well if you ever want to sell the files, I and I’m sure others would be interested.
this is the kind of stuff i went to school for, Applied Engineering and Mechatronics, i love these videos and the silly experiments that actually do provide a lot of useful data, stay safe out there Jimbo
Given your brother's name I really was to say, Looks like them Duke boys are at it again...🤣🤣🤣🤣 How to get a better golf cart, join your local golf club and just "borrow" one of there's. Have Duke waiting with the trailer just off the 10th hole...🤣🤣🤣🤣
Having owned several gas golf carts, the one i had with worst gas mileage was a lifted yamaha with big tires, it still got 32-35 mpg. If you want a speedometer/odometer on your golf cart, there are many cheap bicycle speedometer on the jungle site that can be programmed down to golf cart sized tires.
Thanks for the Gasoline golf cart info! I have to post an update to the video, Someone spotted a calculation error I made. We actually got closer to 40 MPG with this contraption..... and that was at full throttle.
Jimbo always takes on the impossible and then shares successes of not so much successes. I'm waiting for him to tackle a perpetual motion machine. If anyone every can do it, Jimbo can.
Thanks for the great video, Jimbo. Didn't realize how much power was lost through the alternator. Kind of like a transmission power loss at the wheels. Cheers 🍻
The wacky little projects you come up with never cease to amaze me lol. Who would've thought this would actually function as well as it does. Happy Sunday and enjoy your coffee!
The traveling music starting at 12:109 reminded me the song Hot Rod Lincoln. To paraphrase a line or two, "Son, you're gonna drive me to drink man' / If you don't quit drivin' that hot rod Cush man." No groans pleeze. 🙂
I think you need the original numer of 12v batteries in the original configuration but much smaller batteries, so you have you power source with the engine static as a power bank and the alternator as a charging source whilst underway.
For fun future projects, I’ve always wanted to try doing a hybrid go-kart with an AC generator and AC motor, using a variac as a speed controller. Figured it’d be way more efficient, with fewer losses compared to switching DC to AC. Years ago I picked up a huge 50A 240V variac at the MIT Flea and figured it’d be perfect. Of course, it probably weighs more than the harbor freight engine you’ve got powering this.
Nice and gentle way of telling everybody that they dont know what they’re talking about without saying it.. lol. Was like explaining to a kid why they cant do something, repetition and examples “with pictures”.. You should try making a 4wd cart out of old starter motors.. independent all wheel drive.. have a regular motor for typical driving and a panel for switching power if stuck..
Stay tuned! I made a huge mistake in my fuel economy calculations. We actually got close to 40 MPG. sooooo... perhaps the petroleum batter is a bit more interesting despite it being inefficient.
JIMBO!!! it would be quite entertaining and quite the christmas present if you put a big heavy flywheel on the gas motor to help with your acceleration... maybe. The thought is that it would help sustain acceleration until the torque (current) demand of the drive motor drops to a level the gas battery can keep up with. may not be worth your time but it would be fun!!! You'd need a lot of weight spinning pretty fast to make it work.
Large horizontal flywheel underneath the carriage like where a mower blade would be, bonus of gyroscopic anti-rollover force. Problem being all the mass for the flywheel requires even more acceleration power.
It's always weird seeing how flat Kansas is. I live not far from the highest elevation in Ohio state (it's around 400m) and while it's no Switzerland, it sure is compared to your state lol. Some of the hills here are insane. If you are crazy enough to love climbing hills on bikes, I know from experience it's pretty unforgiving here! At least going downhill on a bike is fun... until you have to make the return journey.
he just happens to live in a really flat part of Kansas. We have extremely varied terrain, and we could find him some big hills not far away if needed.
True story on those efficiency numbers, we had an automotive alternator on an electric converted woodmizer sawmill, the battery for the hydraulics was not getting enough charging just intermittently running off the motor for the blade, so we hooked it up to a 3hp 3 phase motor to provide charging while operating, the 60 amp alternator could stall that motor, it should have been able to make 2200 watts of power or 150 amps at 14v. ended up adding another 2hp motor to it, but it was stupid loud when running. Now we have an 80 amp battery charger that silently does a great job.
The benefits of living in a rural area is that the neighbors are used to strange farming contraptions and innovations so a golf cart out on a venture isn't the strangest thing on the road. Meanwhile the cops are still thinking of if it's worth it to go out and take a look at a golf cart on the run.
Jimbo at less than 25 MPH you may want a SMV triangle on the back. And have a bale of hay and 5 gallon bucket of cracked corn along "Just checking the cows Officer!" As always I enjoy your carings on Fred!
11:20 Maybe not with just a capacitor, but with some power electronics you could make it so the capacitor gets charged when you're off throttle so that it can give you a temporary boost when you floor it. That'd defeat the simplicity though
Of course something like that could be done, but its not simple. we are trying to make this system simple so we don't loose the audience. We will do a more complex system in the future.
Back in the day folks used huge old single cylinder motors, often diesel, for power on the farm. They ran very slowly so to keep wear and fuel usage as low as possible. Too large for our use but using a large cylinder low speed engine would be interesting. Turning low rpm's into high rpm's using electricity would be good clean fun.
Start and stop is always the milage killer. Use the momentum and weight to preload a launch mechanism that's triggered during acceleration to provide a mechanical propulsion assist so less current is necessary and the stall is prevented. The same concept will also greatly increase mileage by attacking the area where most energy is wasted...start and stop.
Dunno about other people but I NEVER suggested a super capacitor for THIS circuit setup. I suggested a "part 2" where you go back to an automatic voltage regulator on the alternator, and use an electrical motor controller for throttle. That way the alternator is always outputting 36v or whatever, and the capacitors charge up when you start the gasoline engine. Then when you floor it using your ELECTRIC motor controller, you have 400+ amps available for a few seconds. You'd have that thing doing wheelies. Then, when you let off the throttle and are only using 2kw, your caps will charge back up. I personally like to see you push your projects to the limit, rather than switching to new ones.
Ahh the coffee tastes even better! As an electrician, good job with the maths Jimbo! Sounds like we need more torque, not necessarily horsepower. Hmmm if only their were a little bitty torquey engine that were good to run on kerosene, diesel, veg, wmo, atf, and more.
I love diesels, but the goofy little 3hp diesel we have is NOISY and shakes violently. I need to source a better diesel engine for cheap. Perhaps a Z482 Kubota...hmmmm
This is a really fun project! In the spirit of wacky things to try, how about a vehicle with a petroleum battery running a compressor, storing compressed air in a tank and then powering a compressed air motor?
That one might be a bit too risky. You would need a lot of volume and pressure to make that work and if you make one mistake it can be lethally explosive - much worse than a gasoline engine or lead-acid or lithium battery. It's a cool idea, but maybe not one Jimbo could test out.
@reverse_engineered There have been experimental cars run on compressed air before...and really the air tank would be just a buffer to get over the high demand of acceleration. As to efficiency, I am sure it would be pretty low. :)
Hi Jimbo, thanks for doing the video, this country cruise generated some very interesting test results. I was surprised at how cool the alternator was after the ride, especially since you were getting about twice its rated output for 30 minutes. Note that car alternators are rated with a constant 5,000 rpm shaft speed with infinite input power. I have observed over the past 50+ years that brush motors typically have 70% efficiency. So, the only easy way I can see to prevent the engine bog is to have a current circuit on the alternator output. You could use a large bank of super caps, along with a circuit that starts dumping charge when alternator current exceeds 90 amps but, you would need to design a boost circuit and many kilo-farads of capacitors so, not too practical. I'm not sure what to suggest for further ideas that would be to your liking. You have the backwards approach to most people's modifications. While most people are modifying their golf cart with a Suzuki Hayabusa, you use a unique lawnmower Frankenstein modification. Having retired as an electrical and mechanical engineer, I always enjoy what you come up with - keep up the good work!
Also need to keep in mind the efficiency range of the alternator. I have no idea how fast it's turning now, but it's possible that turning the engine faster would put it out of that range.
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Some folks obviously just don’t understand what it means to do things because they’re FUN. I love this channel.
No new carb? No new more efficient alternator? No figuring out a custom programmed circuit to increase that 72% capacity to 99% or to use that excess capacity to charge and discharge a capacitor when necessary to prevent that bog down? No custom 3D printed gearbox to run a thingamabopper? No completely redesigned motor to create regenerative braking? No trying to get a golf cart up to highway speeds? I was sure by now you would have inspector gadgetted that thing to beat the Renault in a drag race! 😂 But seriously, love the channel. Thanks for the entertainment and knowledge.
Your channel makes me feel like a kid excited to wake for Saturday morning cartoons.
We will throw technology at this problem, but the first version is being kept super simple.
Well he could set up a current sense for the electric motor, and when that drops to a low level, use the excess capability to charge a big honking capacitor (or a battery) out of circuit, up to its limited voltage. And then when the current sense on the motor exceeds a level, switch the big honking capacitor (or battery) into the circuit to provide more kick. Of course, it won't help efficiency any, but maybe it can do burnouts. :P
Can’t believe I’m saying this 🤦🏼♂️, but, “STICK a TURBSKY on ‘er! Do it fer DALE!”
🇺🇸3️⃣🦅
Would a permanent magnet motor be any more efficient?
The best way to do this is replace the drive motor with a 4phase motor then drive it right from the alternator fields.
One of my smartest professors once told me that one test is worth a thousand expert opinions. I like your hands on approach and the quality of your videos. Well Done, Sir!
You know the experimentation drive is strong when you're out test driving golf carts in December.
Just wait until January!
at least the cart got heated seat
You have taught me how to understand mathematical stuff way better then my school ever did thank you
Thanks for the kind words.
You can also put a HUGE flywheel on the petrol engine, to store some power for takeoffs.
I'd put some sort of 2.8Kw limiter into the system to limit maximum takeoff power to just under the engine's max output.
I actually put a 9” steel pulley as an extra flywheel on the predator 212 on my mini offroad tractor. It greatly smoothed power output and reduced the frequency of stalling when high loads were incurred at low RPM.
That would be my suggestion, some sort of one way like a sprag bearing to drive the flywheel shaft so it can speed faster than 3600 rpm and also coast a variator between the engine and flywheel so when under very little load the rpm can go up.
Yes I like this idea of a flywheel to smooth out and give more power!!!
So, a mechanical capacitor.
As always, Jimbo, excellent! On diesel electric locomotives , even they are only running 70% +/-. The newer GE/Wabtec locomotives are running a little better than that, I understand. If anyone could have discovered how to squeeze out better efficiency, the railroads would have found that by now. So, your fun and very entertaining project actually reveals the math behind the scenes that engineers have been dealing with for the past 80 or more years! Now, how cool is that? Lol! Just like engineers have to do, sometimes, because as the saying goes, it is what it is, and you just have to work with what you got. The fun part? Thinking outside the box and challenging oneself to come up with solutions for challenges. You do that part very well, my man! Might I add, with the best sense of dry humor this side of the pond . . . Lolololol! Looking forward to the next set of diabolical shenanigans. 😅
Thank you so much! I really appreciate that you understand the efficiency issue. Believe it or not I have to argue with folks when I tell them this system is inefficient.
Even though it’s inefficient, there’s reliability in simplicity. There’s a balance to be had. What good is a 100% efficient device that is not reliable? 50% of the time, it works everytime!
Electrical generation for the grid is a far bit more efficient, but that's using gigantic turbines in very well controlled environments. It's just not practical to reproduce that kind of thing on a smaller scale, even the size of a locomotive. It also requires a lot of maintenance to keep everything within tight tolerances.
There are a lot more efficient generators, what the problem is mostly the price, and probably the power density.
Electric cars have about 60% regen efficiency, wich is battery -> inverter -> motor (accel)->motor (generator)->inverter -> battery. My point is that all those steps are all within the 40%, so 80-90% efficient generator/motor is achieved by EV-s. Heck even just adding syncronous rectifiers to this alternator will give it about 2-3% efficiency boost, by eliminating 1-1,2v wasted on the diodes.
@@robotcantina8957 The "rule of thumb" I've considered for years is that energy conversion from any type to another is around 50% efficient. So it's an ignorant public that thinks an EV is efficient. Like it or not, many power plants are still carbon driven so Original energy (say from natural gas) to electricity costs 50%. Then halve that from transmission losses so now at 25%. If it stopped there (and it doesn't, the EV itself has loss converting back to mechanical energy), then still wasted is the difference between running the Natural Gas in an Internal Combustion engine (nominally 35% efficient) and the (less than) 25% you've ended up with for your shiny expensive new EV. That says nothing of the massively increased load on the national electrical grid already barely managing demand OR the horrible waste of natural resources within the batteries and super-overweight components for the EV itself. Put another way, I won't be rushing out to buy an EV anytime soon.
Jimbo, I wanted to say thank you. I paused your video in the middle to go fire up my 212 minibike with ape hangers and take it for a spin. I've not had it out in probably a year and a half.
It makes me want to build some other fun contraptions.
Thank you for this video! I wish I had a wand to promote this to millions more eyes. Which, I suppose is only 1/2 millions more people...anyway.
I've been converting cars/tractors to electric for 10yrs and taking them to shows. I can't tell you how many times I get asked why I don't just, "put a alternater on a wheel so I don't need them bat-rees!" Why not just tow a second battery? When one dies, switch over to the second and charge the first while you drive, etc...
My current project is an old VW pickup. The plan is to run a portable generator to power my onboard charger as I drive to extend my range. I don't need my range extended but I do need to find out how many mpg a Harbor Freight generator gets!
Your experiment is probably the most inefficient method of cruising a golf cart and I love it! I can't wait to see what results I get.
Great job!!
Gas generators like the small ~2-3kW size have terrible efficiency. I did a crappy test with a killawatt meter and calculated less than 30% from fuel to power.
It all in the math, unfortunately they also have to know theory in order to understand how it all works.
Well done Jimbo!
19mpg. Not too shabby.
Keep up the good work 😎
Thanks! It turns out I made a mistake in my calculations and we actually got close to 40 mpg. I'll release an update soon.
@robotcantina8957
Even better! 😎
In the early post-war Soviet Union there was a diesel-electric bus, the ZIS 154, that had a similar configuration as this golfcart.
In comparison to regular busses, it had an obnoxiously high fuel consumption of 65L/100km. They also put gasoline engines in some of those busses, as there were problems with getting enough diesel engines from the seperate factory. Because that system turned out to be unreliable (fuel consumption wasn't that big a priority, but may still have played a role), the bus got replaced pretty quickly with the conventionally driven ZIS 155 with a now front placed gasoline engine. The SU was a big advocate for gasoline busses btw.
I love Duke's shot of you buzzing along on that thing in front and then dipping down to to speedometer reading north of twenty instead of ten. I feel like there was a concerned eyebrow raise when he saw that.
LOL, it was a WTF moment for Duke.
I enjoy this channel. I'll never create anything like this but it's the first video I click on when they come out. Thanks Jim and chase driver Duke.
Thanks!
I totally understand the production time for videos. We used to do videos of our bus restoration and gave up since it was taking more time to produce videos than the actual work.
Yes indeed, it take a massive amount of time to do anything when its being videoed.
Now all you need is a wind splitter and a diffuser and a four foot tall spoiler for aerodynamics, and an attachment on the front to hook up horses since you're near Amish country
I've been an electrician for over twenty years now. In my teenage years, I was a small engine mechanic. And now I build grace engines outside of being an electrician. I find this very interesting!
I'm glad you are finding this interesting. its really a lot of fun.
The engine falling on its face reminds me of a stick shift car.
same scenario, only with an electrical load.
Yes!
Old american cars really did that??? 😂😂..................I guess no light when iddle 😆
The AFS Trinity used ultra capacitors about 20 years ago. I road in it. It accelerated like a Porsche Cayenne. It was a prototype based on a Saturn Vue SUV. It retained the front Saturn engine and had a custom rear differential with the electric motor. So yes, ultracapacitors can be used. You would have to figure out the circuitry. I'll bet some viewers could design a basic circuit for a 6 pack of ultracaps.
Thanks for loading up the engine until it stalled! I did something like this nearly 20 years ago and was shocked when I stalled the engine. I didn't know the math but I understood WTF happened.
Man, I love this channel. Making a homemade generator soon!
I love your videos and the ingenuity that you put into them. They are both informative and enjoyable. Changing the pully ratio to a smaller pully on the engine would give you more torque on the alternator so that you could come up with more amps to keep it from stalling. You would however not be able to produce as many volts so it wouldn't go as fast. If however, you had a way to change the pully ration you may be able to solve both problems.
Thanks! Maximum watts that can be generated is 2900 if you include the loss in the system. Changing the pulley ratio still means the maximum wattage is 2900. Spinning the alternator fast with the overdrive pulleys we are using also improves efficiency.
Your videos are epic, Vice Grip is mostly entertainment but your channel is mostly science and both make me grin in equal measure
That was a great explanation of the problem Jimbo. This has been a fascinating project and I'm glad you decided to build it.
Don’t forget that brushed motors aren’t very efficient either. Your wheel horsepower is probably under half the engine horsepower
He's calculating 3.9 hp out of the alternator. If the motor is 80% efficient that would be 3.1 hp to the road. Probably closer to 70% efficient so 2.7 hp. As you said, less than half.
Diesel electric locomotives use a similar system. Their alternators and motors are more efficient but overall maybe 65% of the horsepower produced by the engine gets to the track.
An alternator is actually a brushless motor out of nature, if it were a DC motor or a "generator" like what cars from the 50s had, the power loss would be alot worse, it was rare to see more than 90 amps from a generator compared to 140 from a alternator
I was waiting for a good bump to knock your phone off the cart. But then I spotted the strip of velcro during your math lesson. Whew! 😅
Yes, it was a blast
Sooo... no planned "big block" upgrades to the petroleum battery? Bummer.
I wouldn't mind seeing a diesel version.
@@Rattus-Norvegicus He doesn’t even have seat belts yet🤣. How fast do you want it to go?
Though I think at some point there will be a limit to how many amps the DC motor can handle.
So let’s think about it. Suppose he put the 720 cc Kubota in there and increase the output by 4 fold. So now imagine he has 4 alternators and each of them is peaking at say 80 Amps. Each Alternator has a lead going to the motor, that’s 320 Amps. That 320 Amps is being delivered to a single contact on the DC motor………
The other thing is the DC motor may have an NGO RPM limit so . . . ..
The other problem is weight. The motor sits behind the rear wheels, which is a bad place for a motor. As the weight behind the rear wheel increases understeer on the front wheels increases. When that occurs the weight distribution and road conditions determine how the vehicle steers.
BIG BLOCK is of course always the answer, but for now give me time to sort out this contraption.
@ Uh😎 where would you put the motor mounts, OUCH?
Question, how much rotational torque, say in a crack shaft and flywheel, could you put on the axial center of gravity of a golf cart sufficient to flip it while moving at a moderate speed ?
@@robotcantina8957I would love to see a jungle site diesel BIG BLOCK upgrade to this lol
I’m one of those people that cannot fathom why anyone would expend the energy to criticize what you are doing. Please keep doing! Looking forward to a V2 of the petroleum battery.
My favorite channel to watch while making breakfast on Sunday mornings!!
Always a great way to start the day, coffee and Robot Cantina.
Needs a V twin predator swap!
Even a 420 would be nice. Maybe version 2.0 with a better cart.
@tk429 a 4 wheel cart with better brakes would be a good idea if he was going to keep going faster. Those 3 wheels are unstable if they hit bumps at a angle. There's gotta be a front brake kit for these things with all the mods people do to them in places like Florida. Maybe front go cart disks
@@KR-hg8be Probably wouldn't be hard to hit up somebody like Go Power Sports and see what they have. I bet you could adapt a go cart disk or the rear disk for a mini bike to it.
I 100% agree that a 3 wheeler like that would have to have hella bump steer. I wonder why nobody makes a trike golf cart with one wheel in the back and two up front like a quad. Hmmmm.......
The 30 mpg or more for golf cart is like a car manufacturers estimated MPGs. Is it possible?
Yes, if you are rolling down a mountain with your engine off!
The reason ultracaps aren't used in electric vehicles is they don't have a high enough power density. And when the density improves on ultracaps, the chemistry has already improved on lithium batteries.
Yet another well illustrated video. You just prove that math’n is hard, and es-plaining is even harder to make it easy to understand. Well done!
Good stuff Jim! I have my fingers crossed that you'll try installing the little diesel engine to see if it has more low end torque than the gasoline engine. I've been wondering if the 196cc diesel would be the better choice because of the torque curve needed to drive the alternator during the initial acceleration. Although the gasoline engine will provide more overall horsepower, the diesel engine may provide more low end torque than the gas engine, where you need it. (Also maybe anger a few mosquitoes)
The little diesel is a great engine for experiments, however that thing is NOISY and it shake violently. We want a quiet solution. Perhaps a Z482 kubota diese would be a better choice.
Thanks as always Jimbo for thinking up these experiments and giving us the technical details of why these contraptions do what they do. I find a perfect balance between fun and technical.
Daz from Australia
The traffic start picking up 😂 tell this to Los Angeles ! Love this guy
LOL, I lived in the Los Angeles are for a few years, Yeah that's traffic.
The thing with the supercaps can be done, if you run the alternator field to keep a continuous voltage (as it would normally be in a car) and materialize a 150a PWM controller out of thin air - and hook up the supercaps between the alternator and the PWM driver power input.
Such a powerful driver is not that common to find for cheap. But DIY can probably be done for
get a 48v lipo with a bank of capacitors I was thinking like the ones used in big power car amps that help prevent a voltage sag when the amp pulls a lot of power from the speakers hitting deep base
This setup would likely be more efficient, too. The only question would be whether the setup fits with the intention of the project. The batteries would essentially be replaced by a cap. I’d like to see this, though!
Yes indeed that would work, but in our system we are dual purposing the alternator as a motor controller and a power source.
I tried for months to make my own PWM motor speed controller using mosfets and an Arduino, but I kept blowing stuff up. I was converting a pedal trike to electric with a 700 watt 36v motor. After the circuit failed and the motor went full power on me unexpectedly, I decided to buy a commercially available controller before I got myself hurt.
@@WarrenGarabrandt Making a motor controller is tricky. Unlike switching an LED, motors have a large inductance and produce a back EMF even when no power is applied. Motor controllers have sophisticated electronics with values that are carefully calculated to ensure it can handle the large peak currents and avoid shoot-through while switching. It's certainly not for the faint of heart, even if you have a background in electrical engineering.
Thank you for these videos. I have wondered how a generator connected to a motor would do and these videos got straight to the point. You do teach how things work also.
Really enjoyed this episode, Jimbo!
🏆👍🏼
Hey, three things:
• as an under-trained Jack-of-all-Trades-Master-of-None, my “technical” assessment of the WOT Bog would’ve been “Rotational resistance of alternator may occasionally exceed available torque of petroleum battery”, and left it at that. I wouldn’t have given the technical explanation a moment’s consideration. However, I have to confess that, although I already understood what was happening, I really enjoyed your brief Electrical Engineering Explanation [abbreviated to EEE! 😬 in the Robot Cantina Study Guide]. I found the numbers interesting, atypical for a guy like me… I never knew BHP had an electrical analog. 🤔
• As an inmate in the Kommifornistan Prison Kamp, I would love-love-LOVE to see these Petroleum Battery Carts mass-produced and imported here, for no other reason than to stick-it to our slimy Diktovernor. Ol’ Grewsom would have a conniption! 😆
• I do realize that you don’t have much time to devote on Robot Cantina Merch, but I personally would love to purchase one of those metal “phone holders” featured in this week’s episode. Is that custom fabricated, or was it a repurposed item?
Thanks for all you do, Sir!
LOL, California needs hybrid's like this. The phone holder thingy is a robot cantina exclusive. I 3D print them for all the "telephones" that we use for filming the video series.
@ Oh, that’s a print?! Great resolution, I mistook it for metal! Wish I could get prints like that out of MY printers. 😏
Well if you ever want to sell the files, I and I’m sure others would be interested.
this is the kind of stuff i went to school for, Applied Engineering and Mechatronics, i love these videos and the silly experiments that actually do provide a lot of useful data, stay safe out there Jimbo
Given your brother's name I really was to say, Looks like them Duke boys are at it again...🤣🤣🤣🤣
How to get a better golf cart, join your local golf club and just "borrow" one of there's. Have Duke waiting with the trailer just off the 10th hole...🤣🤣🤣🤣
LOL, Indeed. I can see it now, a golf cart jumping the water hazard with the Dixie horn playing.
@@robotcantina8957 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Another wonderful video as always Jimbo. Great to see that this Frankenstein's monster contraption is holding up so well.
Nice this is my Sunday morning routine
Coffee and Cantina. :D
Thanks for your time creating/posting. I always enjoy these vids!
Watching your videos every Sunday morning is a must for me… thanks Jimbo
Having owned several gas golf carts, the one i had with worst gas mileage was a lifted yamaha with big tires, it still got 32-35 mpg. If you want a speedometer/odometer on your golf cart, there are many cheap bicycle speedometer on the jungle site that can be programmed down to golf cart sized tires.
Thanks for the Gasoline golf cart info! I have to post an update to the video, Someone spotted a calculation error I made. We actually got closer to 40 MPG with this contraption..... and that was at full throttle.
@@robotcantina8957 that's impressive, for a motor that never shuts off.
Right on time Jimbo
Jimbo always takes on the impossible and then shares successes of not so much successes. I'm waiting for him to tackle a perpetual motion machine. If anyone every can do it, Jimbo can.
LOL, I would love to make perpetual motion machine videos, those videos get a lot of views. Hmmm....
Great video as always, makes Sundays always better. Keep it up!
Great stuff! Your projects certainly fill my imagination with possibilities
Thanks for the great video, Jimbo. Didn't realize how much power was lost through the alternator. Kind of like a transmission power loss at the wheels. Cheers 🍻
This knowledge is helping me wrap my head around some of the wiring issues I am experiencing with my car
Always a good way to spend a Sunday morning.
Horsepower is a goofy metric. Since it's "work done", _over time_ it's dynamic, and engine speed is relative to HP. Cool vid, Jimbo.
The wacky little projects you come up with never cease to amaze me lol. Who would've thought this would actually function as well as it does. Happy Sunday and enjoy your coffee!
Yes, it works really well.
Right hand turns... This sure isn't NASCAR.
LOL, we are going to need a bigger engine to compete in NASCAR... hmmmm
Excellent balance of detail and brevity!
The traveling music starting at 12:109 reminded me the song Hot Rod Lincoln. To paraphrase a line or two, "Son, you're gonna drive me to drink man' / If you don't quit drivin' that hot rod Cush man." No groans pleeze. 🙂
Hands on experiments the best. Especially for us that went to the school of hard knocks.
I think you need the original numer of 12v batteries in the original configuration but much smaller batteries, so you have you power source with the engine static as a power bank and the alternator as a charging source whilst underway.
Yes, a 48v surge capacity of 5-10 seconds would probably do it? Either lead acid or Lithium or maybe supercapacitors.
Keep on mathin' Jimbo! Some of us love the nerdy aspect of the experiments.
I enjoy your content. always thought provoking. Keep up the good work.
For fun future projects, I’ve always wanted to try doing a hybrid go-kart with an AC generator and AC motor, using a variac as a speed controller. Figured it’d be way more efficient, with fewer losses compared to switching DC to AC. Years ago I picked up a huge 50A 240V variac at the MIT Flea and figured it’d be perfect.
Of course, it probably weighs more than the harbor freight engine you’ve got powering this.
I have watched all videos of this golf cart! It’s been a great journey!! Keep the great videos! AAA+
Nice and gentle way of telling everybody that they dont know what they’re talking about without saying it.. lol. Was like explaining to a kid why they cant do something, repetition and examples “with pictures”..
You should try making a 4wd cart out of old starter motors.. independent all wheel drive.. have a regular motor for typical driving and a panel for switching power if stuck..
I love this channel! It's as fun as it is educational.
This was very informative, precise the test i was hoping for, just not the result, but never mind, now we know,
Thank you very much
Stay tuned! I made a huge mistake in my fuel economy calculations. We actually got close to 40 MPG. sooooo... perhaps the petroleum batter is a bit more interesting despite it being inefficient.
Amazing 👏 thanks for the video!!
I congratulate you for your efforts to educate ,as for myself it brings memories of my youth
JIMBO!!! it would be quite entertaining and quite the christmas present if you put a big heavy flywheel on the gas motor to help with your acceleration... maybe. The thought is that it would help sustain acceleration until the torque (current) demand of the drive motor drops to a level the gas battery can keep up with. may not be worth your time but it would be fun!!! You'd need a lot of weight spinning pretty fast to make it work.
Put the flywheel on the alternator which is spinning much faster.
Large horizontal flywheel underneath the carriage like where a mower blade would be, bonus of gyroscopic anti-rollover force.
Problem being all the mass for the flywheel requires even more acceleration power.
@@Spudz76 Please show us your frictionless drive for your idea.
Working in the cold is a BIG advantage
Yes, We will have to do some warm weather testing at some point.
"Duke has some better things to do"
I doubt it.
Very succesful project!
It's always weird seeing how flat Kansas is. I live not far from the highest elevation in Ohio state (it's around 400m) and while it's no Switzerland, it sure is compared to your state lol. Some of the hills here are insane. If you are crazy enough to love climbing hills on bikes, I know from experience it's pretty unforgiving here! At least going downhill on a bike is fun... until you have to make the return journey.
I really wish we had a hill or two around here for testing purposes.
he just happens to live in a really flat part of Kansas. We have extremely varied terrain, and we could find him some big hills not far away if needed.
Excellent. I can't wait for your next video.
time being entertained is a fraction of the time that one puts into entertaining others!!!
Great video Jimbo. Definitely learned soemthing.
This idea reminds me of the gasoline range extender that Scout is going to use in their new trucks
Great test! Thank you, greetings from Brazil.
Thanks!
True story on those efficiency numbers, we had an automotive alternator on an electric converted woodmizer sawmill, the battery for the hydraulics was not getting enough charging just intermittently running off the motor for the blade, so we hooked it up to a 3hp 3 phase motor to provide charging while operating, the 60 amp alternator could stall that motor, it should have been able to make 2200 watts of power or 150 amps at 14v. ended up adding another 2hp motor to it, but it was stupid loud when running. Now we have an 80 amp battery charger that silently does a great job.
The benefits of living in a rural area is that the neighbors are used to strange farming contraptions and innovations so a golf cart out on a venture isn't the strangest thing on the road.
Meanwhile the cops are still thinking of if it's worth it to go out and take a look at a golf cart on the run.
YES, YES and YES. Love it!
Jimbo at less than 25 MPH you may want a SMV triangle on the back. And have a bale of hay and 5 gallon bucket of cracked corn along "Just checking the cows Officer!" As always I enjoy your carings on Fred!
Thanks Jimbo great job
Thanks again, makes mu Sundays!
Great Video! You deserve more subscribers.
You know....shits and giggles is a valid reason for doing everything
Indeed, just having some fun.
Nice to see you 😊.
I built a diesel powered golf cart the fuel economy is crazy good. Love this project 😊
11:20 Maybe not with just a capacitor, but with some power electronics you could make it so the capacitor gets charged when you're off throttle so that it can give you a temporary boost when you floor it. That'd defeat the simplicity though
GOOD IDEA!!! JIMBO PLEASE!
Of course something like that could be done, but its not simple. we are trying to make this system simple so we don't loose the audience. We will do a more complex system in the future.
Back in the day folks used huge old single cylinder motors, often diesel, for power on the farm. They ran very slowly so to keep wear and fuel usage as low as possible. Too large for our use but using a large cylinder low speed engine would be interesting. Turning low rpm's into high rpm's using electricity would be good clean fun.
Start and stop is always the milage killer. Use the momentum and weight to preload a launch mechanism that's triggered during acceleration to provide a mechanical propulsion assist so less current is necessary and the stall is prevented. The same concept will also greatly increase mileage by attacking the area where most energy is wasted...start and stop.
Dunno about other people but I NEVER suggested a super capacitor for THIS circuit setup. I suggested a "part 2" where you go back to an automatic voltage regulator on the alternator, and use an electrical motor controller for throttle.
That way the alternator is always outputting 36v or whatever, and the capacitors charge up when you start the gasoline engine. Then when you floor it using your ELECTRIC motor controller, you have 400+ amps available for a few seconds. You'd have that thing doing wheelies.
Then, when you let off the throttle and are only using 2kw, your caps will charge back up.
I personally like to see you push your projects to the limit, rather than switching to new ones.
Ahh the coffee tastes even better! As an electrician, good job with the maths Jimbo! Sounds like we need more torque, not necessarily horsepower. Hmmm if only their were a little bitty torquey engine that were good to run on kerosene, diesel, veg, wmo, atf, and more.
I love diesels, but the goofy little 3hp diesel we have is NOISY and shakes violently. I need to source a better diesel engine for cheap. Perhaps a Z482 Kubota...hmmmm
This is a really fun project! In the spirit of wacky things to try, how about a vehicle with a petroleum battery running a compressor, storing compressed air in a tank and then powering a compressed air motor?
Even more inefficient, but I love it!
That one might be a bit too risky. You would need a lot of volume and pressure to make that work and if you make one mistake it can be lethally explosive - much worse than a gasoline engine or lead-acid or lithium battery. It's a cool idea, but maybe not one Jimbo could test out.
You win for the most inefficient design of 2024 ! love it!
@reverse_engineered There have been experimental cars run on compressed air before...and really the air tank would be just a buffer to get over the high demand of acceleration. As to efficiency, I am sure it would be pretty low. :)
Great information as always jimbo and crew
Ignore the trolls. These videos are some of the most useful on the internet.
Nice cup of coffee and another great video 💯
Yes, I love my coffee!
Hi Jimbo, thanks for doing the video, this country cruise generated some very interesting test results. I was surprised at how cool the alternator was after the ride, especially since you were getting about twice its rated output for 30 minutes. Note that car alternators are rated with a constant 5,000 rpm shaft speed with infinite input power.
I have observed over the past 50+ years that brush motors typically have 70% efficiency. So, the only easy way I can see to prevent the engine bog is to have a current circuit on the alternator output. You could use a large bank of super caps, along with a circuit that starts dumping charge when alternator current exceeds 90 amps but, you would need to design a boost circuit and many kilo-farads of capacitors so, not too practical.
I'm not sure what to suggest for further ideas that would be to your liking. You have the backwards approach to most people's modifications. While most people are modifying their golf cart with a Suzuki Hayabusa, you use a unique lawnmower Frankenstein modification. Having retired as an electrical and mechanical engineer, I always enjoy what you come up with - keep up the good work!
Just fantastic 😊 great stuff!
More RPMs. Get rid of the limiter. These engines will spin much faster and produce more HP
yes. but it will require a new pulley to take advantage of that RPM and turn it into more torque. Because otherwise the motor will still bog down
Some will break faster too. Like the briggs 5hp.
And burn even more fuel
Also need to keep in mind the efficiency range of the alternator. I have no idea how fast it's turning now, but it's possible that turning the engine faster would put it out of that range.
The 212 burns a good deal more fuel over 3600rpm. They are designed to be most efficient at 3600.