More powerful simple generator

One of the best science toys I have ever built is the simple generator built from magnet wire wrapped around a box spinning around a nail.

I therefore decided to build a new one, improving on the original design to meet my purposes.

First, I decided I wanted stronger magnets. So I replaced two of the four magnets with similar size rare earth magnets. These are fairly dangerous as a pinch hazard, but with a little care I was able to place them as the outer two magnets.

Next I used a hockey puck display case with two holes drilled in it as a replacement for the cardboard box. It has the advantage of being the perfect size and being clear.

I still used a nail to rotate the magnet. I however added some paper so the two magnets on top are parallel to the two magnets on bottom. I also taped the magnets together so they are less likely to move.

One big problem with the original design is that the nail slips when spinned rather than moving the magnet. This I cured with blue stik. It is temporary if I ever want to disassemble the generator but does a good job increasing friction between the magnets and the nail.

Then I replaced the 30 gauge magnet wire with about 400 feet of 24 gauge magnet wire. This was a mistake, 30 gauge wire is ideal. 32 gauge is so small as to drive me nuts when I wire the generator. 24 gauge wire just doesn't get enough voltage. Even with the huge magnets I only get 6 volts out of the generator. This is even less than my original generator with the smaller magnets!

Still this new generator does have its perks. It does produce a lot more current than one with smaller magnets or lower gauge wire. The total power is therefore a lot higher. This means you can actually feel when it is powering something. When shorted out it really fights you. Also, unlike the original generator it can power small electromagnets or motors.

Here is an example of it throwing coils up in the air. I simply placed the coil on a large magnet with a bolt connected to it. Then I run the generator:

Stolen Books are Better

After about an hour of searching I have determined that stolen audiobooks are superior to all other options.

I bought a few audiobooks from itunes once. Never again. The copyright protection was a pain whenever I would switch computers and nothing about it made up for this added hastle.

Since Amazon dropped DRM from its music I thought that would be the way to go. Nope, no luck at all. They only sell audible audiobooks which are if anything even worse than itunes books. As best as I can tell the only way to get audiooks which are not a pain in the ass is downloading from torrents.

The only other option I consider reasonable is purchasing CDs and burning them. I think I will pass on that. The next best option is just get old books. Many audiobooks of old books are free available for free online.

Almost enough to make me start reading for Librivox, but I don't have the voice for it...

Index Funds in the 84th Percentile

I am a big fan of index funds. They seem to beat managed funds most years and virtually never are far below average.

Still, this past year was particularly impressive. Index funds beat 84% of managed funds!

Energy content of Uranium

The statistic that a barrel of oil contains the energy equivalent of three years of human work inspired me to do the same calculation for Uranium 235.

A barrel of oil is about 138kg.

The energy density of Uranium 235 is 79 500 000 MJ per kg. So a little multiplication gives the total energy of 128kg of Uranium 235 is 1.097 x 10^16 J.

A person on average burns about 100Watts, or 100J/second. This works out to 3.2 x 10^9 J/year

Some division shows that an amount of Uranium 235 with the same mass as a barrel of oil contains the energy equivalent of three and a half million years of human labor! If there was ever a better summation for why I believe in nuclear energy, I sure haven't heard .

Less interest

I have finally paid off the last of my credit card debt and student loan debt. I actually had to think about whether to keep the student loan debt longer because the interest rates are so low, but even the loans at 2.2 percent are a good deal more than any similarly safe investment can earn these days.

Corporate Peace

One thing that corporations have been remarkably good at is promoting peace. While the defense industry is a huge exception to this, war just disrupts too many profits if it occurs somewhere there is business. Although there are some exceptions to Thomas Friedman's claim that no two countries with a McDonalds have ever gone to war with each other, it has generally been true.

I am reminded of this when I see that we are finally easing travel restrictions from China. It is blindingly obvious that we should do this. A huge tourist market is being blocked by draconian travel restrictions. We are hurting our own business for no reason other than silly paranoia. Not only do we stand to make a fortune off removing these restrictions, but tourism is important for national security. When people come and visit this country, it is a lot harder for their government to feed them propaganda about us. This will do a whole heck of a lot more than sending you through body scanners to keep us safe.

The only thing that helps us more than tourists, is college students. America educates the rich and powerful of the entire world. This is an absurdly good investment for us. You can go to almost any country in the world and the leader of that country has friends whose children are studying at some big name American university. Do you think they would want to go to war with us while those kids are here?

Peak oil video

One barrel of oil contains the energy equivalent of three years of human labor.

That was about the only thing this video said which I had not heard before:


Still, if I was going to leave Southern California and move to a small farm in Missouri it would be because of the problems cited in this video. There really are some real challenges we will face in the next hundred years.

Some of the advice at the end was pretty laughable though. Sure, if you take this seriously learn to make and shoot a gun or bow, learn to garden, learn some martial arts. Even consider living on a small farm in the middle of nowhere. Local currencies though? Really?