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I recently read an interesting article about a process, or idea, the writer was calling degresson. The guy is clever and is always looking for new ways to view the world and maybe how to improve some aspects of it. He says he is a Druid so I always find myself just wondering, “what am I dealing with here,” but he is a clever druid. What he points out is, there may have been inventions, technological developments in the past, and he appears to mean at any time in the past, that literally are better than some of more recent counterparts.
Obviously, he was making this point because he doesn’t think some of the items or processes we do, or use today are all that beneficial and we may be enamored by them simply because of hype being thrown at us day in and day out. One example he gave was that of the cheap plastic razor which is in common usage now, but in the past was represented by the safety razor. The older model was made of steel and only the thin blade was thrown away and was used for decades.
The shaving cream was in a ceramic mug and was nothing more than a soapy bar when brushed made a froth. There was no expensive can of air powered shaving cream, that in the end, and not too many shaves later had to be discarded. Lots of production cost and lots of environmental issues, much greater than simple blade and mug with brush inducing foam.
I thought it interesting as I threw away another plastic devise and then an empty can of foam. While there might be grounds for debate on that, I thought I might take the concept a bit farther.
Right off, I have to make a confession. I am, in part, doing this because I have way too many old things that appear to have no function other than entertaining me in my semi-retirement. These items include an Associated Hired Man hit and miss engine of 2.25 horse power and a generator from a Model M Farmall tractor, vintage 1945 or so.
In addition, I have an electric generating photo voltaic and battery storage system of the most modern design. Occasionally in winter, I have to charge up my battery bank with a generator, in my case 3500 watt Yamaha. So I was thinking I should use the hit and miss to drive the Farmall generator to power up the batteries directly with direct current. All indications were, the one hundred year old motor was actually more efficient for a number of reasons. First off, it will burn anything from bad whiskey to kerosene and it will run continually for years if not decades---and by all appearances, it has.
In addition, it can be easily repaired at very little cost. It will never be something to consider throwing away. It will run forever. The generator is also of that mode but slightly more suspicious, as an alternator might be a better choice. Maybe one from Freightliner.
So the plan is to hook up a line shaft that will go overhead to a position in the shed where the alternator is mounted. This will require a couple of those large flat belts seen mostly in photographs of old threshing machines. The motor is mounted outside and has a flat belt attached to a line shaft that runs the power inside where there is another flat belt directing the power to the alternator. I should be clear, most of these kinds of contraptions are of interest to me because I am a pathetic motor head and find myself being easily amused by engines, cast iron pullies, huge belts and spinning alternators, not to mention the quiet thumping of a 300 rpm, 100 year old engine.
The idea here is to get the entire thing set up and have the alternator moving at 1500 rpms producing 100 amps of twelve volt juice. Once this is all done, which I will now admit it is not, then the wire, after running through a change controller, goes directly to the battery bank. From the battery bank to an inverter that changes it to alternating current and then into our home to power us in a comfort we have become accustomed.
The big test will be if the old system, the highly visually intensive, slow moving, hundred year old, three hundred pound stationary engine costing lets say, three hundred dollars (used), can match the performance of the screaming, short lived modern power generator that in reality only will produce 1200 watts at full revolution. We will not mention the cost of the new generator but it will be more by many fold than the relic, and if the new one breaks, the repair may match the cost of buying a new one--it might get chucked. So this is my test of degress. Will it match the progress? If it does, which I suspect it will, What is the implication?
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