Norman Albers Posted January 8, 2007 Share Posted January 8, 2007 I tried to enter on this but don't see it, so I will speak without specific manufacturers' names. I got and love the construction of an electric garden cart, delivered for not quite $300, with two powered front wheels and a trailing third, well-castored with a greasefitting. This is a new class of tool(USA in this case) and it perfectly fills my need, carrying loads of firewood, and occassionally road rock mix for potholes. Two hundred pound load, and I don't have to support it. I was going to develop this for $500, and mentioned this a while back. I am 57 years old, live on bountiful land and enjoy chainsawing, but not wheelbarrowing, wood. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bluenoise Posted January 8, 2007 Share Posted January 8, 2007 Yeah wheelbarrowing bites! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cap'n Refsmmat Posted January 8, 2007 Share Posted January 8, 2007 You didn't see it because it read as if you were being paid for it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Albers Posted January 8, 2007 Author Share Posted January 8, 2007 Ay, ay Cap'n we'll keep things unspecific. This is a new class of tool and I love it. Once I asked a man on an electric wheelchair, outside in town, about his machine. He said it went "quite a while" on a charge, maybe a few miles. Now I rebuild player pianos and there's a class of modern ones made in the 1970's. To slowly turn the perforated roll there is an electric motor geared down as you always must through a gearbox of plastic gears. You guessed it, this is the weak point and thirty years later I have 3 or 4 clients with stripped gears I cannot replace. Bummer, the rest of the piano and player are good. So I e-mailed the garden cart manufacturer, and they answered that for $90 they sell replacement battery (normal lead-acid lifetime, sealed unit) with the two gearcases! I was impressed by this answer, just so they don't go out of business the year before I need it. I should be sure to stock up in a few years. There seems to be no other way to get torque from a small (size of a child's fist) electric motor. This has 26:1 gear ratio. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gcol Posted January 9, 2007 Share Posted January 9, 2007 I suppose you have already considered using a stepper motor and toothed belt drive, with digital speed control? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Albers Posted January 9, 2007 Author Share Posted January 9, 2007 No, educate me please. I see belts like that here and there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gcol Posted January 9, 2007 Share Posted January 9, 2007 Would not, in a million years dare to presume to educate you, Norman. There is a mountain of net info on stepper motors, and I suggested tooth belt drive as non-slip alternative alternative to gear trains. I handcut my own gears. If they strip, it is because I have chosen the wrong material or wrong tooth size for the motor to load application, or deliberate overload when testing to destruction. If yours strip, it is poor design or jamming of the load (perforated drum), or even inadequate lubrication. I have to say I don't automatically trust plastic gears in sealed plastic boxes designed for toys, hobbyists or the low-cost DIY trade. They are made down to a price. Not designed to last the decades your pianos are expected to last. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Albers Posted January 9, 2007 Author Share Posted January 9, 2007 Thanks I'll go Google. What is clever in this design is having two drives so each handles half the power. The wheels are small but pneumatic tires. I shall handle it in moderate terrain. Talk to you in five years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
weknowthewor Posted January 9, 2007 Share Posted January 9, 2007 A gcart like this one? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Albers Posted January 9, 2007 Author Share Posted January 9, 2007 We must keep commercial references out of posts. If I recall seeing the one you mentioned it is large like an oversized barrow. Mine is a little lower than the common barrow with an inverted U handle with controls; three wheels. Reading wiki on stepper motors, they seem to favor small, controlled motions. Would they serve efficiently in this relatively high-torque (if you don't reduce gearing so much) running? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
weknowthewor Posted January 10, 2007 Share Posted January 10, 2007 No it's not commercial references.I just wanted to know the picture of your gcart.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Albers Posted January 10, 2007 Author Share Posted January 10, 2007 Picture roughly the same area looking down at it, as a normal barrow. The two front drive wheels are just outboard so wheeltrack base is 25 inches. This, along with the battery slung between in a steel jacket, makes clearance only about 4-5 inches, so we're not talking all-terrain vehicle. The rear castoring wheel leaves the tub lower in the back than the usual wheel barrow tilt, so the whole bucket sits a few inches lower than a barrow. A broad U-shaped (two bends) handle with the controls comes up to waist height. Two forward speeds and reverse. Who knows, maybe when I get old, like next year, I'll attach a rudder stick and a bench and tool up to the mailbox at 2mph. WEEEEEEE. That is an interesting design point. I had figured that a fast hiker walks 3mph. This is nicely set at 2mph on high speed. PS The name rhymes with a hadron. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Albers Posted January 19, 2007 Author Share Posted January 19, 2007 The energy capacity does not sound awesome: running time on a charge is just over one hour. However, my task is a few hundred feet, and even at twice that, I could count on 8-10 runs, carrying 4-5times what I cared to in my barrow, with compromised mid-low spinal discs. That is twice what I need to do in any day, and will move a cord and a half of cured hardwood in one week. . . . . . . . GCOL, I have a lower power need to drive the paper rolls on player pianos at all of a half-watt of mechanical power. I look at small stepper motors at only $20 or less but quotes on the controllers are not clear. I need speed and reversing control. What is avaliable is DC (or AC) supply and I can arrange that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phi for All Posted January 19, 2007 Share Posted January 19, 2007 We must keep commercial references out of posts.Go ahead and use the references. You're a trusted member and it sounds like you've found a great product and are simply entusiastically passing along a good reference. We probably jumped the gun when you first posted because we get so many Rolex ads and people joining just to post links to sales sites. Sorry, sorry, it'll never happen again, and by never I mean... somewhat frequently. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Albers Posted January 19, 2007 Author Share Posted January 19, 2007 Thanks, babe, let's talk shop. (Neuton) WEEEEEE, I find it to be a new class of tool. For me, this is a HOMO SAPIENSIS MOMENT. Somebody please toss the big bone. <Thus Spake Zarathustra>. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cap'n Refsmmat Posted January 19, 2007 Share Posted January 19, 2007 We probably jumped the gun when you first posted because we get so many Rolex ads and people joining just to post links to sales sites. Sorry, sorry, it'll never happen again, and by never I mean... somewhat frequently. No, you mean "never, because we'll delete all of the evidence too." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Albers Posted January 19, 2007 Author Share Posted January 19, 2007 Dun,... dan,...dahn....DA DAH, dun don dun don dun don... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Albers Posted January 21, 2007 Author Share Posted January 21, 2007 GCOL: I have the barrow accomplished but what you have clued me to is stepper motor systems for my player piano clients, who need all of one watt of mechanical power to run the perf'ed roll. The motors are "cheap" but the cheapest answer to DRIVER and CONTROLLER are a U-DO-IT for $40, nice. Is this where it's at? Regime of low power and RPM of 120 max. , torque of just under 1 N-m if I have my conversions, argh. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gcol Posted January 21, 2007 Share Posted January 21, 2007 Yes, Norm, they must be digitally driven. There is the catch, gotcha! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Albers Posted January 22, 2007 Author Share Posted January 22, 2007 Offer me a deal I can't refuse. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Albers Posted January 29, 2007 Author Share Posted January 29, 2007 After a good load of pothole sand/rock mix, and then three excellent loads of standing dead madrone firewood I had just cut, the battery took a charge for just over two hours, less than one-half total capacity. BIG LOADS of dead, a full wheelbarrow-full, minus one or two going uphill on grass. <THEME MUSIC>. I had travelled a kilometer, so the spec of "at least an hour" at maybe 2kph makes sense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Albers Posted February 18, 2007 Author Share Posted February 18, 2007 You may think my electric garden cart is only cute. The South Coast (Los Angeles) Air Quality region purchased four thousand electric lawnmowers to trade gasoline ones from the public. These from the Neuton Company.At $400 a pop retail this is a cool $1.6 mil, folks. I wondered about their scale; these folks have really set up shop. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Albers Posted February 19, 2007 Author Share Posted February 19, 2007 Maybe at wholesale this is $1.3 mil., equal to the Nobel. I am considering a shift of focus. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
weknowthewor Posted March 2, 2007 Share Posted March 2, 2007 check the nasa's website(nasa.com), they have succeeded on this project, also having battery and solar operated cars just 4 people intrested like u. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Albers Posted September 6, 2007 Author Share Posted September 6, 2007 One year into my working with my electric garden cart I am happy to see two full cords of hardwood (dried) stacked in my shed, plus a half-cord of sticks. This is all I need for a fairly cold winter. The cart is strong as per these specs on loads: "90 kg. on level surfaces; 70 kg. on 10-degree slopes; 68 kg. on a 20-degree slope." This is for real and I torque nice loads up the path to my shed. Five bags of groceries or glass recyclables? No problem, house door to car door. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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