Human Powered Laundry Spinner

[toggleswitch2]

Imagine a Blackstone washer using this enegy source!

http://www.blisstree.com/articles/human-powered-laundry-spinner-71/

 

[toggleswitch2]

Kind of like the washer on the Gilligan's Island show.
Anyone have a pic of that or that scene?

 

[yogitunes]

this would be a neat idea...just some changes...since this is a "real washer" by design...why not reverse the belt and let it agitate the clothes also, and using a 10 speed bike wouldn't that allow to ramp up to higher speed spin with less pedal power?

Also, maybe a "rack" for the bike to sit on for this reason and not kill the bike for this use only, that way you have a bike to ride to the store and then put in place to wash clothes...this idea he has is good if he uses the same designed base for other uses like a generator....one bike, used on many standard base platforms...and yet still used as a bike

just a thought!

 

[chestermikeuk]

And Washer & Spin Dryer...!!!

Which is a modern Hotpoint machine....even has its water tank on top...!!!

2,000rpm ???? keep pedalling faster!!!

http://www.cyclean.biz/mainmenu.html

 

[jasonl]

I can imagine maybe an automatic direct drive WP/KM/MG machine with a bicycle connected to a belt to the transmission. Plus the bike could drive a small generator to operate the timer and solenoids. So you really could set it to wash and pedal. Or if you can hook it up to AC, you can have the timer and solenoids only and the motor bike powered.

Or if it's a reversing motor machine (like Mytag/GE/Norge, etc), you'd have to figure a way to reverse the belt so you can agitate or spin.

Either way, you'd lose weight washing clothes.

 

[panthera]

I suspect

such a setup would work best with a FL, very very warm water and an advanced enzyme based, phosphate built detergent.

It shouldn't be that difficult to design a mechanism to "reverse" direction regularly.

On the other hand, I wonder how long it would be necessary to pedal the bicycle in order to store the energy needed to do a load of wash (not heating the water) and spin it dry?

The washing part is easy, really the best detergents more or less clean without much agitation at all. It is the wringing that is a nightmare.

Let's see:
A reasonable fit person can do about .2Kwh for a bit over an hour without killing themselves or being dead for the rest of the day. Since my LG washes 15.4lbs (7Kg) in without heating and spins them dry at 1200rpm for .5Kw, that means two and one half hours pedaling to generate the needed electricity. And yes, that is the actual amount which ends up in the storage battery according to the folks who did the tests, not the amount the rider actually puts out at the alternator (whopping big losses for the electronics and storage).

One guy figured out, it works out to be cheaper in food to just do a 1kwh solar panel and storage for $1,000.

Beats me - I like the idea, just not sure it's practicable.

One thing is obvious, the "bicycle" would have to be so extensively modified for constant use that it is absurd to imagine it being easily swapped back and forth for on-road use. This would be one situation where a extremely stiff frame and really well designed bearings would pay for themselves.

 

[alr2903]

Somebody at a college made a "gilligan's island" washing machine as a project for third world countries. It was on one of the morning news shows. it looked like a bike and horizontal 55 gallon drum. The requirements were it had to be constructed of things that would be available to people of limited means, they had footage of a village sharing the use of one machine.