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Author Topic: Alternative Energy in the projection suite Don Cross Film Handler Posts: 97 From: Charleston, WV, USA Registered: Jan 2005 posted 02-28-2005 06:19 PM                     One could almost but a former cold war nuclear sub from the former Soviet Union and then have it shipped over. Note the icons looking a bit green  |  IP: Logged Jon Miller Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 973 From: San Diego, CA, USA Registered: Sep 1999 posted 02-28-2005 08:24 PM                     quote: Dean Kollet I could see this with the current "spinning" wave at the gyms and workout clubs. You go, workout, and watch your favorite movie while you provide the power. Hmmm...the multiplex I do my film-festival work at is next door to a very busy YMCA. If it was (excuse the pun) within my power, their fleet of LifeCycles could be put to a very good secondary use...  |  IP: Logged Randy Stankey Film God Posts: 6539 From: Erie, Pennsylvania Registered: Jun 99 posted 02-28-2005 08:55 PM                     It's funny because Lifcycles (at least the kind I know about) are nothing more than a pedal powered generator. The generator powers the electronics system when you pedal. The computer simulates pedaling uphill by slapping different values of resistors in-line with the generator output. It wouldn't be that hard to connect them all up to the projectors in your booth. Then, when you turned on a projector, all the people pedaling in the gym would suddenly end up peddling uphill!  |  IP: Logged Ken Russell Film Handler Posts: 23 From: Smyrna, GA USA Registered: Jun 2004 posted 03-01-2005 01:39 PM                     Making use of otherwise wasted energy sounds like a great idea. But… how much is really needed to get the image on the screen and the sound in the auditorium? My guess is, at a minimum, six to ten kilowatt. That’s a lot of peddling or solar panels measured in acres by my estimation. Turn it around. If we can abandon the traditional rock and hammer methodology of getting the presentation out and make the process as efficient as possible, how little energy could we get away with? And, given that, what are the possible alternative energy sources? Simple things such as replacing incandescent lamps with fluorescent go some of the distance. If 99% plus of the energy put into the lamp house passed through film gate I would imagine that the required energy would be measure in the hundreds of watts versus thousands as it is today. I have no idea if this could be made to work but imagine a gas laser with a tube having the cross section equal to that of a scope film frame. Then get rid of the shutter and strobe that laser 48 times a second in time with the intermittent. For that matter, why continue count on bouncing an image off a surface at all. I know, if it could be done some one would have already done it… Or not… Focus on increasing the efficiency of the speakers and you can reduce the power needed to drive the amps. We humans seem so ready to accept what has been done as the basis and sum of what can be done while dismissing what has yet to be done as impractical or even impossible. Ken  |  IP: Logged Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 03-01-2005 11:27 PM                        There is a huge amount of wasted energy inherant in our power distribution system itself because of the need to transmit electricity at high AC voltages. It's efficent for transmission, but inefficient for actual use. Almost every electrical component needs to take household 115vac and convert it back down to what it really needs and that is almost always 12-24VDC and now with computers, 5vdc. If at the local level energy could be deliverd closer to the voltage and format that most electrical equipment needs, that loss which occurs in the conversion from high voltage to low, alternating to direct current, would be practically eliminated. This is what happens in the house trailer industry. Manufactures offer every imaginable type of equipment and applicance that you would find in your home....but they all run on 12vdc. If that could be applied to whole cities, think of all the energy that would be saved just by eliminating all those the transformers, not to mention the tons of copper. And of course now with super high intensity LED technology taking off and it becomes viable to replace many types of energy sucking incandescents with super bright LEDs, using low voltage DC as the primary electrical service to households would be a natural. Didn't electrical service at one time consist of both DC and AC? In the Loew's Kings booth in Brooklyn, I recall along with the AC service, there was a huge DC service panel that fed the three 35mm lamphouses as well as a followspot. 48V straight from Con Edison thru to the ballast resistors and the carbons -- imagine....no generators, no rectifiers, no hum, no nuttin.  |  IP: Logged Jon Miller Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 973 From: San Diego, CA, USA Registered: Sep 1999 posted 03-01-2005 11:58 PM                     Wikipedia: War of Currents Historically, DC would have required "tons of copper" to transmit over long distances, a task AC could perform without much sweat with a few transformers here and there. Solid-state power converters are helping to make efficient long-distance transmission of DC a reality, though...  |  IP: Logged William Hooper Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1879 From: Mobile, AL USA Registered: Jun 99 posted 03-02-2005 12:55 AM                        quote: Frank Angel but they all run on 12vdc. If that could be applied to whole cities, think of all the energy that would be saved just by eliminating all those the transformers, not to mention the tons of copper. Oops, the copper costs would be more with DC, due to DC voltage drop. A number of EP organs have been made inoperative due to someone's having scavenged the 00 negative return cables running from the generator to the 1st chamber, over the prosc to the next chamber, & down to the console. That's a hugely expensive chunk of copper. quote: Frank Angel Didn't electrical service at one time consist of both DC and AC? In the Loew's Kings booth in Brooklyn, I recall along with the AC service, there was a huge DC service panel that fed the three 35mm lamphouses as well as a followspot. Wasn't there some mention of this earlier here? Most DC was grandfathered in from before municipal conversion to AC. Streetcars ran on DC, so DC was provided in cities, equipment in buildings was spec'd around its supply, etc. As the utilities began to cut costs & try to eliminate DC service, they provided incentives to buildings like replacing for free DC elevator motors, re-wiring & equipping other building electrical services for AC, etc. When the streetcars went, most DC went, although some larger cities with older existing buildings with equipment like DC elevator motors, manufacturing plants with DC equipment that hung around longer than the conversion to AC, etc. still have a DC service in the older parts of town. New Orleans never really had an incentive program to retrofit buildings to AC from DC (they just didn't offer new DC hookups) because the St. Charles streetcar line has never ceased operation. They still have DC service in the older parts of town, & a number of older buildings still have significant DC equipment operating in them. There are a number of non-functioning organs around the US that can't immediately be brought back into operation because the motors powering the blowers are DC motors. Those big things are expensive to replace with AC motors. [Edit] Cool, the Wikipedia article in the description of the competition between Edison's promotion of DC & Westinghouse/Tesla's promotion of AC for power transmission mentions a famous feature of the propaganda war. Edison tried to convince everyone that AC was more dangerous, & to prove it, offered to & arranged to kill an elephant that had been sentenced to execution for killing a man. Edison, to show how deadly AC was, did it with AC & filmed it to show everyone. The Edison short "Electrocuting An Elephant" is the only short that can follow "Gus Visser's Singing Duck" on a bill. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0231523/ http://www.roadsideamerica.com/pet/topsy.html http://www.uidaho.edu/fugue/elephant.htm  |  IP: Logged

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