alt.energy.homepower

Steve,
Car Alternators can be efficient but a major modification is needed first.
The field is about 3 amps. 3 amps times 14 volts is 42 watts. You have 30-42
watts to satisfy before you can push any current into a battery, so replace
the rotating field ( removing the brushes also ) and replacing the field
with a donut magnet. You may not have quite as much current but you start
off with a much more efficient generator.

Ray



"SteveC" wrote in message
news:47cc185e$0$4060$9a566e8b@...
> if you could somehow power a car alternator to run, could you charge a
> bank of batteries somehow? Like using solar power to power an electric
> motor, which in turn, turns the alternator which charges up the batteries?
>
> Time to hit the junkyard for a couple of cheap alternators for an
> experiment!!
>