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Electricity Generators

C

Carnival Forces

Supreme [H]ardness
Joined
Feb 9, 2003
Messages
4,297
does anyone happen to know how much one would cost? Say..to power a folding farm a 100 strong? That'd be about 6000watts max...
 
I'm getting a price of $2279 for that generator. Are you looking for a backup generator in case the power goes out? That's what I call dedication.
 
jpmkm said:
I'm getting a price of $2279 for that generator. Are you looking for a backup generator in case the power goes out? That's what I call dedication.
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lol.

nope, i'm looking for a fully fleged (sp?) generator all on its own, to power boxen. I'm going to start a charity to fold (http://folding.stanford.edu), and i think the basement would be a good place to put the boxen, so i wanted a stand-alone generator (as it would most likely be cheaper).

So in short, no, i was not going for an uber-UPS :p
 
it is very unlikely that you can make your own electricity in the quantity needed cheaper than you can buy it from the electric company. Gasoline or Diesel generators are very inefficient, loud and smelly they arent much good for more than backups. Unless u have some massive solar panels or a wind powered generator its unlikely you can do better than the 'ol power company.

If u look at the specs it would cost about $2.50 an hr to run that genearator not including oil.
 
SHOtime said:
it is very unlikely that you can make your own electricity in the quantity needed cheaper than you can buy it from the electric company. Gasoline or Diesel generators are very inefficient, loud and smelly they arent much good for more than backups. Unless u have some massive solar panels or a wind powered generator its unlikely you can do better than the 'ol power company.
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how much do solar panels cost. no joke.
 
pretty pricey then u have to consider installation and set up. Don't think im against anyone making their own power its just that anyone thinking about doing it should realize that rarely does anyone save money except over the very long run.



Solar Panels

From that site panels to make 6000 watts would be roughly $21k
 
Carnival Forces said:
how much do solar panels cost. no joke.
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A LOT! I don't know exactly how much, but I'm willing to bet it would be more than $10000. Then you have to take into consideration cloudy days and nights. Do you want battery backup or do you just want to run off the grid during those times?

Generators really are not a practical alternative to grid power. Solar panels can be, but they can take 10-15 years to break even.

edit: Or $21000. That's quite a bit for charity.
 
jpmkm said:
A LOT! I don't know exactly how much, but I'm willing to bet it would be more than $10000. Then you have to take into consideration cloudy days and nights. Do you want battery backup or do you just want to run off the grid during those times?

Generators really are not a practical alternative to grid power. Solar panels can be, but they can take 10-15 years to break even.

edit: Or $21000. That's quite a bit for charity.
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yeah, it is :( It's hard to raise money...

so there are no efficient generators? howabout ones that run off natural gas?
 
jpmkm said:
What exactly is wrong with grid power?
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well; if you want to pull off 6000Watts of power; not only is the electricity bill going to sky-rocket, but it might not even work; as i live in an OLD house w/ OLD wiring (like, only 2 plug-points in the entire house are grounded (i.e. have the third prong)). So, if i were to get an electric generator, i could:
A)ensure i have a grounded, safe, stable supply of electricity
B)save money over the long-term
C)be able to set it up in my basement (that's where i want to make the farm.)
 
Generating your own power is going to cost more than buying it from the electric company. With solar, or wind, you will never recoup the cost of the equipment before it breaks down. Also, if there is no sun, or wind, you get no power.


With diesel/gas generators, the cost of the fuel will be tremendous.

well; if you want to pull off 6000Watts of power; not only is the electricity bill going to sky-rocket, but it might not even work; as i live in an OLD house w/ OLD wiring (like, only 2 plug-points in the entire house are grounded (i.e. have the third prong)). So, if i were to get an electric generator, i could:
A)ensure i have a grounded, safe, stable supply of electricity
B)save money over the long-term
C)be able to set it up in my basement (that's where i want to make the farm.):
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A - Only if you use gas/diesel, not solar
B - No. Just, no.
C - If you want a loud thunderous racket (gas/diesel) OR solar, not for inside
 
Retro Rex said:
Generating your own power is going to cost more than buying it from the electric company. With solar, or wind, you will never recoup the cost of the equipment before it breaks down. Also, if there is no sun, or wind, you get no power.


With diesel/gas generators, the cost of the fuel will be tremendous.
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huh, what if i run it on Biodiesel ?
 
Carnival Forces said:
huh, what if i run it on Biodiesel ?
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Collecting the used oil will become a part time job. A generator will probably use as much gas in a day as most cars use in a week. Then you have to make sure the tank never runs empty or there goes 100 boxes. It sounds good in theory, but if people could generate electricity cheaper than they can get it from the grid then all the power companies would be out of business.
 
jpmkm said:
Collecting the used oil will become a part time job. A generator will probably use as much gas in a day as most cars use in a week. Then you have to make sure the tank never runs empty or there goes 100 boxes. It sounds good in theory, but if people could generate electricity cheaper than they can get it from the grid then all the power companies would be out of business.
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then is there no other option then getting the house rewired (never gonna happen.)?

howabout natural gas electric generators? are the more efficient?
 
well about the natural gas generators, ever since the gas companys were deregulated in the US the price has gone up and up so one would cost a fortune to run. If you are really desperate and you have a semi large creek around set up a water wheel ;) . Or just us your power company, they create power efficiently for the rest of us.
 
Or possibly a large windmill. Though that won't necessarily be a constant source of power.
 
k1pp3r said:
well about the natural gas generators, ever since the gas companys were deregulated in the US the price has gone up and up so one would cost a fortune to run. If you are really desperate and you have a semi large creek around set up a water wheel ;) . Or just us your power company, they create power efficiently for the rest of us.
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did you read the part about the wiring in my house?

i thought about the water wheel; but the creek isn't big enough.

jpmkm said:
Or possibly a large windmill. Though that won't necessarily be a constant source of power.
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won't work; don't have enough wind :(

 
How about rigging up some kind of semi-perpetual motion energy generator? Figure out some way to harness all the wind and heat from those 100 boxen and run them through a wind-powered generator, somehow.... :p

Or maybe open a gym, and have all the stationary bicycles also generate electricity :p
 
Buckus said:
How about rigging up some kind of semi-perpetual motion energy generator? Figure out some way to harness all the wind and heat from those 100 boxen and run them through a wind-powered generator, somehow.... :p

Or maybe open a gym, and have all the stationary bicycles also generate electricity :p
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heh, i wish, that'd be awesome...have case fans power t3h case! :D

re: the bicycle idea, i was wondering, how much would i have to cycle a day to keep the boxen up?
 
Carnival Forces said:
heh, i wish, that'd be awesome...have case fans power t3h case! :D

re: the bicycle idea, i was wondering, how much would i have to cycle a day to keep the boxen up?
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You probably couldn't cycle enough to keep one box up for a day. You might be able to cycle enough to run the box, but as soon as you stop the box would stop.
 
jpmkm said:
You probably couldn't cycle enough to keep one box up for a day. You might be able to cycle enough to run the box, but as soon as you stop the box would stop.
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:(

well then, scrap that idea...
 
Actually, if you could get Toshiba to sponsor you, you could have a mini nuclear plant... but thats a little unlikely...

With the creek, depending on the configuration of your property and size of creek, you could probably make some sort of damn/pond to create a larger vertical drop for the water in order to properly drive a turbine.

The Department of Energy has a wealth of information on generating power... May even be able to get a tax credit/write off for it. Really depends on your area as to what is possible.

Anyways, how are you arriving at your 6000W figure? Do you have this hardware already? If not, check out this cluster. The creator claims that it runs faster than four P4s in parallel with 200W peak usage. Most of the modern mainstream performance processors are not power efficient at all, so if you use a Cyrix, Transmeta, mobile chip, etc... you will be able to maximize the power usage / processing power for your farm. Also, try to minimizing the number of hard drives / other devices that contribute to power consumption, but not to folding.
 
I think I've seen that cluster before. From the calculations, though, it seems that he'd need at least 300-400 of those running to equal the computational power he would get from 100 good 'ol P4 or AMD systems. When will Pentium M be available for desktop? I have seen some manufacturer specs on desktop boards for Pentium M, but never seen one for sale.

An alternatives is to leech power off your neighbor, ever so discreetly; If they find out, just say it's for a good cause, because it would be true :D
 
alot of times they dont ever break even.

jpmkm said:
Generators really are not a practical alternative to grid power. Solar panels can be, but they can take 10-15 years to break even.
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for the cost of the cables alone going from generator to your basement you could affford to rewire your house with a beefy power infrastructure for your basement.

Carnival Forces said:
then is there no other option then getting the house rewired (never gonna happen.)?

howabout natural gas electric generators? are the more efficient?
Click to expand...
 
you seriously need to think this through. Not only that, how fast are the machines? Why dont you just sell them all and buy newer crap with equivilant processing power.
 
Whatsisname said:
you seriously need to think this through. Not only that, how fast are the machines? Why dont you just sell them all and buy newer crap with equivilant processing power.
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if you thought through your reply as much as i've thought through this i wouldn't be typing this message now...

wtf do you mean "buy newer crap w/ equivelant processing power?"
second off, i never mentionned what type of machines, b/c i just gave most people the benefit of the doubt in knowing that most Folding farms are comprised of AMD XP CPU's...obviously, you've lost that benefit
third off, you can't criticize me for not thinking something through if you have nothing constructive to say.
 
You needn't rewire the whole house, get an electrician in to run a dedicated circuit from your main line, but be sure to ask about regulations first.

It will probably cost less than anything else.
 
lord_emperor said:
You needn't rewire the whole house, get an electrician in to run a dedicated circuit from your main line, but be sure to ask about regulations first.

It will probably cost less than anything else.
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sweet, so i just ask him about running a "dedicated circuit" ? is that the correct terminology (as you can see, i am not that well versed in the electricity department :()
 
yes i can, i can say whatever i want :rolleyes:

So how powerful are these machines anyway?

Carnival Forces said:
if you thought through your reply as much as i've thought through this i wouldn't be typing this message now...

wtf do you mean "buy newer crap w/ equivelant processing power?"
second off, i never mentionned what type of machines, b/c i just gave most people the benefit of the doubt in knowing that most Folding farms are comprised of AMD XP CPU's...obviously, you've lost that benefit
third off, you can't criticize me for not thinking something through if you have nothing constructive to say.
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Doesnt matter if thats correct terminology or not, because you're going to be talking to him for more than 5 words anyway so he's going to figure out what you want sooner or later.

Carnival Forces said:
sweet, so i just ask him about running a "dedicated circuit" ? is that the correct terminology (as you can see, i am not that well versed in the electricity department :()
Click to expand...
 
Whatsisname said:
yes i can, i can say whatever i want :rolleyes:

So how powerful are these machines anyway?



Doesnt matter if thats correct terminology or not, because you're going to be talking to him for more than 5 words anyway so he's going to figure out what you want sooner or later.
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re: part A)yes, you can say whatever you want, no matter how stupid it is ;)
re: part B)read the posts above to see how powerful they'll be.
re: part C)thanks for shitting all over my question, just because i like to learn is no excuse for you to spread those cheeks and spew.
 
Just hire an electrician to bring in the lines needed to supply enough power for the computers. I'm not sure if you'll need more than one circuit, but you might. It would cost far less than a generator or anything else.
 
A 6000 watt load will take at least a few 15 amp circuits. Three 20 amp circuits would probably be better. Though an electrician will be able to tell you exactly what you need.
 
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