Dc generators

As its name suggests, a generator generates electricity.

 Michael Faraday’s discovery of electromagnetic induction
demonstrated a way to construct a simple generator, but there was little
need for such a device until commercial technologies that used
electricity, such as lights, appeared
n the 1860s and 1870s many inventors sought ways of using Faraday’s
induction principle to generate electricity mechanically. Two kinds of
generators emerged. The first type was a generator of direct current
(DC) electricity. The second type was a generator of alternating current
(AC) electricity. In truth, a DC generator could generate AC current, but
it contains a simple device called a commutator to turn AC into DC. A
commutator reroutes the flow of electrons inside the DC generator, so
that the energy that appears at the output is a pulsing direct flow. An AC
generator does not need a commutator and generates AC directly..
• One of the most important inventors of generators was German 
Werner von Siemens,
• he designed improved DC generators and called them dynamos.
• An even better generator was introduced by French Zénobe-Théophile
Gramme in 1867, which produced substantially higher voltages than
previous attempts.
• In 1871 he demonstrated a working model, and with Hippolyte
Fontaine began manufacturing them.
• Gramme’s dynamos generated AC current and were widely used in arc
lighting systems.
• In 1872, however, von Siemens reemerged and invented what is
essentially the modern type of dynamo, referred to as the drum
armature type of machine, which was a more efficient design.
• AC and DC generators were both used from the 1870s on. For
example, AC generators were used in a type of outdoor arc lighting
known as the Jablochkoff Candle.
• However, in the late 1870s when Thomas Edison devised his highly
successful electric lighting system, he used DC generators.
• A major reason for this choice was that Edison wanted to use electric
power both for lighting (for which AC was fine) and for running
electric motors. At the time, there was no good AC electric motor
available, so DC was the only option.
• In 1882 Edison installed DC generators at the Pearl Street station
 facilities in New York City, one of the earliest commercial power
generating plants.
Ac generators

• As electric lighting and centrally distributed power began to achieve

commercial success in the 1880s, inventors began looking for ways to
distribute central-station power over longer distances. Edison’s DC
system was poorly adapted to this, because he had chosen to use
120-volt bulbs and motors. A much higher voltage would have been
easier to transmit down long wires, because at a low voltage much
energy is lost as heat. Edison stations, such as that at Pearl Street,
could be no more than about a mile from the customer. AC offered an
alternative: a way to generate at a low voltage, “step up” the voltage
for transmission using a simple device called a transformer, and then
“step down” the voltage at the customer premises. The only
remaining problem, though, was the lack of a suitable AC motor
design.
• Nikola Tesla, a Serbian immigrant to the United States, devised an
improved AC generator as well as a practical AC motor. Tesla’s system
used polyphase AC, in which the generator generated several different
AC flows that were combined or superimposed onto one another to
create a single polyphase AC output, with the component currents “out
of phase” with one another. The Tesla motor, introduced in 1887, was
designed so that the peaks of this polyphase current supplied power at
just the right moment in the rotation of the motor, and the resulting
induction motor as he called it, ran smoothly. With a practical AC motor
and generator in hand, along with transformers to raise and lower
voltage, Tesla’s system could be used by power companies to create
ever-larger networks of power distribution using massive power plants,
such as the Niagara Falls hydroelectric plant built in the 1890s. Larger
power systems helped lower costs, which stimulated demand for
electricity, especially in homes.
Edison’s generator
• Before the connection between magnetism and electricity was discovered, 
electrostatic generators were invented. They operated on electrostatic
 principles, by using moving electrically charged belts, plates, and disks that
carried charge to a high potential electrode. The charge was generated using
either of two mechanisms: electrostatic induction or the triboelectric effect.
Such generators generated very high voltage and low current. Because of
their inefficiency and the difficulty of insulating machines that produced
very high voltages, electrostatic generators had low power ratings, and were
never used for generation of commercially significant quantities of electric
power. Their only practical applications were to power early X-ray tubes, and
later in some atomic particle accelerators.
• The operating principle of electromagnetic generators was discovered
in the years of 1831–1832 by Michael Faraday. The principle, later
called Faraday's law, is that an electromotive force is generated in an
electrical conductor which encircles a varying magnetic flux.
• He also built the first electromagnetic generator, called the 
Faraday disk; a type of homopolar generator, using a copper disc
rotating between the poles of a horseshoe magnet. It produced a
small DC voltage
This design was inefficient, due to self-cancelling
counterflows of current in regions of the disk that were not
under the influence of the magnetic field. While current
was induced directly underneath the magnet, the current
would circulate backwards in regions that were outside the
influence of the magnetic field. This counterflow limited the
power output to the pickup wires, and induced waste
heating of the copper disc. Later homopolar generators
would solve this problem by using an array of magnets
arranged around the disc perimeter to maintain a steady
field effect in one current-flow direction.
• Another disadvantage was that the output voltage was very low, due
to the single current path through the magnetic flux. Experimenters
found that using multiple turns of wire in a coil could produce higher,
more useful voltages. Since the output voltage is proportional to the
number of turns, generators could be easily designed to produce any
desired voltage by varying the number of turns. Wire windings
became a basic feature of all subsequent generator designs.
DC motor
• A DC motor is any of a class of rotary electrical motors that converts direct current
electrical energy into mechanical energy. The most common types rely on the
forces produced by magnetic fields. Nearly all types of DC motors have some
internal mechanism, either electromechanical or electronic, to periodically change
the direction of current in part of the motor.

• DC motors were the first form of motor widely used, as they could be powered
from existing direct-current lighting power distribution systems. A DC motor's
speed can be controlled over a wide range, using either a variable supply voltage or
by changing the strength of current in its field windings. Small DC motors are used
in tools, toys, and appliances. The universal motor can operate on direct current
but is a lightweight brushed motor used for portable power tools and appliances.
Larger DC motors are currently used in propulsion of electric vehicles, elevator and
hoists, and in drives for steel rolling mills. The advent of power electronics has
made replacement of DC motors with AC motors possible in many applications.
cont..
• A simple DC motor has a stationary set of magnets in the stator and
an armature with one or more windings of insulated wire wrapped
around a soft iron core that concentrates the magnetic field. The
windings usually have multiple turns around the core, and in large
motors there can be several parallel current paths. The ends of the
wire winding are connected to a commutator. The commutator allows
each armature coil to be energized in turn and connects the rotating
coils with the external power supply through brushes. (Brushless DC
motors have electronics that switch the DC current to each coil on
and off and have no brushes.)
• A direct current (DC) motor is a fairly simple electric motor that uses
electricity and a magnetic field to produce torque, which causes it to
turn. At its most simple, it requires two magnets of opposite polarity
and an electric coil, which acts as an electromagnet. The repellent
and attractive electromagnetic forces of the magnets provide the
torque that causes the motor to turn.
History and background

At the most basic level, electric motors exist to convert electrical energy into
mechanical energy. This is done by way of two interacting magnetic fields -- one
stationary, and another attached to a part that can move. A number of types of electric
motors exist, but most BEAMbots use DC motors1 in some form or another. DC motors
have the potential for very high torque capabilities (although this is generally a function
of the physical size of the motor), are easy to miniaturize, and can be "throttled" via
adjusting their supply voltage. DC motors are also not only the simplest, but the oldest
electric motors.
• The basic principles of electromagnetic induction were discovered in the early 1800's
by Oersted, Gauss, and Faraday. By 1820, Hans Christian Oersted and Andre Marie
Ampere had discovered that an electric current produces a magnetic field. The next
15 years saw a flurry of cross-Atlantic experimentation and innovation, leading finally
to a simple DC rotary motor. A number of men were involved in the work, so proper
credit for the first DC motor is really a function of just how broadly you choose to
define the word "motor."
• Michael Faraday (U.K.)
• Fabled experimenter Michael Faraday decided to confirm or refute a number of
speculations surrounding Oersted's and Ampere's results. Faraday set to work devising an
experiment to demonstrate whether or not a current-carrying wire produced a circular
magnetic field around it, and in October of 1821 succeeded in demonstrating this.
• Faraday took a dish of mercury and placed a fixed magnet in the middle; above this, he
dangled a freely moving wire (the free end of the wire was long enough to dip into the
mercury). When he connected a battery to form a circuit, the current-carrying wire circled
around the magnet. Faraday then reversed the setup, this time with a fixed wire and a
dangling magnet -- again the free part circled around the fixed part. This was the first
demonstration of the conversion of electrical energy into motion, and as a result, Faraday is
often credited with the invention of the electric motor. Bear in mind, though, that Faraday's
electric motor is really just a lab demonstration, as you can't harness it for useful work.
• Also note that if you plan on repeating this experiment yourself, you should use salt water
(or some similar nontoxic but conductive liquid) for the fluid, rather than mercury. Mercury
can be very hazardous to your health, and requires stringent precautions on its use. The
BBC has instructions on building just such a device using salt water here.
 Joseph Henry (U.S.

• It took ten years, but by the summer of 1831 Joseph Henry had improved on Faraday's
experimental motor. Henry built a simple device whose moving part was a straight
electromagnet rocking on a horizontal axis. Its polarity was reversed automatically by its
motion as pairs of wires projecting from its ends made connections alternately with two
electrochemical cells. Two vertical permanent magnets alternately attracted and repelled the
ends of the electromagnet, making it rock back and forth at 75 cycles per minute.

• Henry considered his little machine to be merely a "philosophical toy," but nevertheless
believed it was important as the first demonstration of continuous motion produced by
magnetic attraction and repulsion. While being more mechanically useful than Faraday's
motor, and being the first real use of electromagnets in a motor, it was still by and large a lab
experiment.

• For pictures of Henry's motor, as well as more information on his further explorations, check
out the Smithsonian Institution's write-up on him (part of the Joseph Henry Papers Projec
 William Sturgeon (U.K.)

• Just a year after Henry's motor was demonstrated, William Sturgeon invented
the commutator, and with it the first rotary electric motor -- in many ways a
rotary analogue of Henry's oscillating motor. Sturgeon's motor, while still
simple, was the first to provide continuous rotary motion and contained
essentially all the elements of a modern DC motor. Note that Sturgeon used
horseshoe electromagnets to produce both the moving and stationary
magnetic fields (to be specific, he built a shunt wound DC motor).

• The BBC has a good set of instructions on building a replica of this motor
here.