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AC Motor / Generator Project

Submitted by esalazar on Sun, 12/02/2007 - 4:48pm.

Electronics

This project started one night while I was lying in bed trying to visualize how an AC motor worked. I knew that it was different from a DC motor as in it did not require brushes and the speed was controlled by frequency instead of voltage. After some research I came up with this project to better my understanding of AC motors.

AC Theory:
AC Current is different from DC in that the polarity is constantly inverting in a given period. For example: Lets say you have a standard battery hooked up to a volt meter. Normally you would connect the positive lead to the positive terminal of the battery as well as the negative lead to the negative terminal. If you wish to generate an AC current you would connect the leads normally for half a second and then invert them (where the positive terminal is connected to the negative lead and the negative terminal is connected to the positive lead) for another half second. If you constantly repeat this process you will have an AC current operating at one hertz (1hz). Where a hertz is 1 / Period. The period is the time the current is positive plus the time it is negative in one cycle, so in our case 0.5s + 0.5s = 1s per period. In America AC voltage to your home is typically 110 Volts at 60hz in a smooth sine wave.

Quick Magnet Theory:
A more in depth theory about magnets can be found here. For our practical purposes all we need to know is that a magnet has two poles, north and south. Poles attract each other when placed from north to south and repel when placed north to north or south to south.

Quick Electromagnet Theory:
An electromagnet is a magnet that is created with a coil. When current passes through the coil a magnetic flux is created. Conversely when a magnetic field passes through the coil a current is created. More information can be found here.

AC Motor/Generator theory
Most of the information I used to design this motor came from this page. I placed six magnets on the rotor with alternating poles and placed 6 coils in the housing with the polarities also alternating. When an AC current is run through the coils the polarity will switch the magnets poles from north to south at the given frequency. Therefor the rotor will turn so that the poles on the magnets will always line up.

Construction:

After I had a good idea of how I was going to build this motor I needed to collect parts. I already had some bolts that I can use for coils along with copper magnet wire. So off to Hobby Lobby. There I found some ultra strong magnets along with construction Styrofoam.

The base for the motor

Dividing the rotor into 6 sections

The completed measurements

Coil winding:
At this stage I had to determine how strong of an electromagnet I needed for the magnets I bought. Since the magnets are rated at “10” in strength, I had to create a electromagnet with enough magnetic flux to successfully repel the magnet.

Along with determining the proper coil windings, I also had to label the polarity of each magnet. I used a +5V DC power supply to test the coil. After experimenting I decided to use 350 turns with 30 gauge wire.

Once the polarity was determined for the magnets, I placed them in the rotor with hot glue.
The base fully assembled

The base with coils.

After the unit was fully assembled it was time to test it out. First I tested to see if spinning the rotor would generate an AC current. I wired all of the coils in series and hooked them up to the oscilloscope. Spinning the rotor by hand produced a rough sine wave at a about 100mv. Now it is time to try powering the motor. To generate a AC current I used a HP 200A audio oscillator at around 50hz. This device cannot supply much current so I ran it at high voltage (70v) through a step down transformer (110V to 12.6-0-12.6). After playing with lining up the coils I was able to successfully power the motor.

A Video of the Motor running can be found here

Nice work! I love how the

Submitted by Woody on Mon, 12/01/2008 - 5:22pm.

Nice work!
I love how the stator by itself looks like a stargate :-) Next step - throw away the magnets and build an induction motor :-)

Wow. I have never seen such

Submitted by Shwigidishwa on Fri, 02/13/2009 - 8:16am.

Wow. I have never seen such a simple design for an AC motor. Not expensive either! I bet that if you gave it a little more strength to the frame, you could get some more speed to generate more voltage. This is totally amazing. It was a great help.

G'day. Nice, I like it. I

Submitted by Dr Who? on Sun, 02/15/2009 - 11:21pm.

G'day. Nice, I like it. I have to make a AC generator for a physics assessment. What is the distance from the magnet to the induced coils?

Thanks.

(email me at jacob_hogan7@hotmail.com)

wow. I never see this. you

Submitted by EnergyChina on Thu, 04/16/2009 - 2:07am.

wow.

I never see this.

you are great!

Great article and

Submitted by billigflug on Thu, 06/11/2009 - 3:40am.

Great article and interesting website.

Hello!! It was an amazing AC

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Fri, 11/13/2009 - 1:09pm.

Hello!! It was an amazing AC motor. I was thinking about the possibility of building an AC motor for myself. Your electric device is a great inspiration. Nikola Tesla invented AC motor around 1884 and patented it in 1889. Its patent is 381.968 from United States Patent Office.
Your AC motor is exactly recreation of Tesla`s patent. Congratulations.

I found the US Tesla patents in the following site:

http://rapidshare.com/files/245209059/7785185-Nikola-Tesla-Complete-Pate...

I will try to build the AC motor according your steps.
Bye!!!

Hello!! It was an amazing AC

Submitted by Sergio from Chile, Latin America on Fri, 11/13/2009 - 1:12pm.

I found the US Tesla patents in the following site:

http://rapidshare.com/files/245209059/7785185-Nikola-Tesla-Complete-Pate...

I will try to build the AC motor according your steps.
Bye!!!

Hello, I am currently

Submitted by Janson on Thu, 02/18/2010 - 10:58pm.

Hello, I am currently working on a synchronous motor for my science project and I am having some problems. My design is almost exactly the same as your motor. The only difference is that I have four coils instead of six. The coils are wound correctly (North, South, North, South) and it is running on AC current at 60 HZ. The only problem is that when I turn on the power supply, I can not turn the shaft fast enough to synchronize it. Can you pleaseeeeeeee tell me how you started your motor. Did you lower the frequency of the AC current or did you do something else. I really need this for my project. Thank You!!!!!!!!!

Hello, I am currently

Submitted by Janson on Thu, 02/18/2010 - 11:02pm.

Now it is time to try

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Sat, 03/13/2010 - 2:53am.

Now it is time to try powering the motor.
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Thank you very much for this

Submitted by fdgdfgd on Thu, 03/18/2010 - 4:29am.

Thank you very much for this information.
Good post thanks for sharing.
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I have a 96 chevy 1500

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Thu, 03/25/2010 - 12:41pm.

I have a 96 chevy 1500 360(V*8).Well i recently changed the motor.before i put in the freon i ran the compressor straight to the battery to see if the clutch would kick on which it did.Doesnt that mean the compressor is good?So when i charged the ac it only took in one can.and the compressor will not kick on when i turn the ac on through the dash knobs.Only if i jump it from the battery.The compressor clutch did not come on while i was charging it ..when i charged i turn the ac on full blast.any ideas where to check?my yahoo im is maldonado779 if you can help

I think this is so good. I

Submitted by james lee on Mon, 04/12/2010 - 7:30pm.

I think this is so good. I really like how your mind works. I am always thinking this all the time. I just your theories.
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I have learned working of AC

Submitted by Harry on Thu, 05/06/2010 - 10:47pm.

I have learned working of AC generator & motor in my 9th std. But this one is quite different. I love the concept. Its so new & hy-tec. Good one I must say.
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I have learned working of AC

Submitted by lupus symptoms on Thu, 05/06/2010 - 10:50pm.

I have learned working of AC generator & Motor in 9th std. But this one is quite different & new. I got to learn one more thing. Thats great.
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AC motor for myself. Your

Submitted by Ramon1982 on Mon, 05/10/2010 - 2:47am.

AC motor for myself. Your electric device is a great inspiration. Nikola Tesla invented AC motor around 1884 and patented it in 1889. Its patent is 381.968 from United States Patent Office.
Your AC motor is exactly recreation of Tesla`s patent. Congratulations. Earth4energy
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