Bucket-borne hydroelectric generator

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By Gareth Branwyn
Posted 2008/06/27 @ 2:24 pm
Category Art & Design, Energy

Pico Hydroelectric Generator in 5 gallon bucket developed by Sam Redfield and tested at La Florida in Guatemala. The generator is meant to be a very small, cheap, low impact generator designed to be used with existing gravity fed irrigation, fresh water, or waste water systems.

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12 Responses to Bucket-borne hydroelectric generator

Max on June 27th, 2008 at 2:59 pm said:

Is there a web page with more info on this project? Are the coils implemented with wirewound resistors? clever!

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tim on June 27th, 2008 at 3:13 pm said:

Yes, more details on construction would be wonderful!

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Leareth on June 27th, 2008 at 3:18 pm said:

A quick google and I found a video of the inventor Sam Redfield explaining it. At least I hope… I have no speakers at ye’ work computer…

http://www.b20-biodiesel.net/Pico_hydro/videos.htm

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Gareth Branwyn on June 27th, 2008 at 3:22 pm said:

The folks who did are http://www.aidg.org. Couldn’t find much in the way of tech specifics poking around their site (which doesn’t mean it’s not there).

There are more pics in their Flickr stream.

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Anonymous on June 28th, 2008 at 8:16 pm said:

Slick design, but you can only get so much energy out of low head-pressure and low mass-flow hydro — I’d love to see the numbers.

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Cat Laine on June 29th, 2008 at 12:27 pm said:

Hey folks,

Cat Laine from AIDG here. Sam wrote up some more info on the system here on our blog:
http://www.aidg.org/component/option,com_jd-wp/Itemid,34/p,1136/

He’s going to try to get me a parts list with some basic specs in the coming week. I’ll post the link here when he does.

Cheers,

Cat

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amanda on June 30th, 2008 at 5:52 pm said:

I’ve been trying to get to aidg.org’s website, with not much success. “this account has been suspended.” Doesn’t always mean it has been, but…

Hope this comes back.

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Bailey Yordie on July 20th, 2011 at 2:48 am said:

I’d love to see plans for this.

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Bailey Yordie on July 20th, 2011 at 2:48 am said:

I’d love to see plans for this.

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Bailey Yordie on July 20th, 2011 at 2:48 am said:

I’d love to see plans for this.

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Bailey Yordie on July 20th, 2011 at 2:48 am said:

I’d love to see plans for this.

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Julian Keesee on December 9th, 2011 at 8:09 pm said:

That would be great in a sewer pipe

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