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Technology

Rechargeable Boots 98

Posted by michael from the ground-pounder dept.
Fancypants writes: "ABCNews.com has posted an article about a Menlo Park, CA company that is developing boots that generate power. Imagine charging your cell phone by walking to class." Seems as if we've done a story before on shoes that generate electricity, but I sure don't see it in the archives.
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Rechargeable Boots More

Rechargeable Boots

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  • Blinky lights... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Andorion ( 526481 ) on Monday October 15, 2001 @05:45AM (#2429983)
    Now those little blinking lights on my cool Nike shoes can go on forever!!

    -Berj

  • electric shoes (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 15, 2001 @05:46AM (#2429986)
    http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/06/22/183825 1&mode=thread

  • wow... (Score:2, Funny)

    by TheMMaster ( 527904 )
    You could make a shoe that smells your feet and applies deodorant when needed... wow

  • It all fits together... (Score:5, Funny)

    by fsmunoz ( 267297 ) <fsmunoz&member,fsf,org> on Monday October 15, 2001 @05:50AM (#2429992) Homepage
    This boots could generate the initial energy needed by this Hydrogen-Based Rotary Engine [slashdot.org], and with that the uptime of this IBM Linux clock [slashdot.org] would be astonishing (and with that kind of energy, imagine a Beowulf cluster of those!)!

    This things do not happen be accident... people moan but eventually /. closes the circle!
    • Yeah, but that means you'll first have to walk around your car a few times in the morning before you can start it...
      • Yeah, but that means you'll first have to walk around your car a few times in the morning before you can start it...


        Or you would plug the whole damn apparatus to the lighter in the car... this way you would still be petrol-dependent, sure, but with a pair of power-generating boots and a bagpack filled with liquid Hydrogen you would still look cool and, er, alternative :)
    • Now they just need to apply the technology to beds. What else do you do in a blackout? Hell the porn industry alone could solve California's energy problems!

  • So... (Score:3, Funny)

    by kafka93 ( 243640 ) on Monday October 15, 2001 @05:51AM (#2429994)
    ... would that be sole-ar powered?

    Doh!

  • Phone-boot? (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    ... prototype boot generates about half a watt of power -- more than enough energy to recharge the boot's built-in battery and a cell phone
    Babelfish + ear = Translation.
    Boot + ass = statement.
    Boot + ear = ???
    No, I don't think it's going to be a hit.

  • how much? (Score:2, Funny)

    by Ozan ( 176854 )
    I'd like to know how much power you can actualy get out of these boots. Charging a cellphone does not need much, but providing just enough for the discman only when you are running would be pretty incentive for us nerds to do some sports, huh?
    • This just in: by reading the article before posting comments, many redundant questions can be avoided... Anyway, just to prove that I did actually read it, here's a relevant quote: "the prototype boot generates about half a watt of power". But the director of the project "[...]hopes that by the end of January the boot's output could be raised to nearly two watts". There.

  • No actual power (Score:3, Informative)

    by pouwelse ( 118316 ) on Monday October 15, 2001 @06:00AM (#2430001) Homepage
    Nice idea, but far from usefull.

    The previous Slashdot article [slashdot.org] on this topic gives actual numbers: 0.0013 W when walking normally.

    This fluffy article gives no numbers on the performance, but with their menthod it should not come even close to being realistic. When you do the math it is theoretically possible to get resonable amount of power from your shoes, but the technology is still experimental.

    As one of the developers of an Open Hardware PDA [tudelft.nl] I can say that you can only do very litte computation for that and it would require an afternoon of walking to scrape enough energy together for a cell phone call.

    Just my 2 Eurocents,
    Johan.

    • I see possibilities here... you could let your children walk around, as a choir or punishment...
      "You've been a very bad boy jimmy, go rechare daddies cell"
    • From the article (you did read it right?):
      >the prototype boot generates about half a watt of
      >power -- more than enough energy to recharge the boot's built-in battery and
      >a cell phone. But Pelgrine hopes that by the end of January the boot's output
      >could be raised to nearly two watts

      • Re:Actual power 1/2 a watt, heading to 2 watts (Score:4, Informative)

        by pouwelse ( 118316 ) on Monday October 15, 2001 @06:48AM (#2430072) Homepage
        From the article: >the prototype boot generates about half a > watt of power

        Because no technical details are available their is no way to know if this is the maximum power output during touchdown of the foot or the average power output during an average person walking at an average pace.

        My assumption is that the quoted 0.5 W is the delivered top power, not the average. This would be more in balance with existing technology. Otherwise they go directly for the next Nobel price for advancing current technology with a factor of 10,000 .

        As a guy who likes technology I hope they win the Noble price, but it is doubtfull.

        Just my 2 Eurocents,, Johan.

    • Re:No actual power (Score:3, Informative)

      by mikeage ( 119105 )
      Almost ;). The previous article was a piezoelectric design for the sole of the shoe... this uses two charged plates being moved through a magnetic field... according to the article, this one does 1/2W, soon to be boosted to 2W.
      • The previous article was a piezoelectric design for the sole of the shoe... this uses two charged plates being moved through a magnetic field...

        That happens to be how piezo electrics work.

    • The article clearly states thet current models output one watt, with 2 watts projected by launch.

  • Okay, I'll ask it....

    "But will they run Linux"

    (Insert jokes about bootstrapping, etc....)

    Tom.

  • Old hat (Score:5, Informative)

    by tomknight ( 190939 ) on Monday October 15, 2001 @06:12AM (#2430021) Journal
    (or should I say old shoe....?)

    The Electric Shoe Company [theelectricshoeco.com] sells these (or rather, a verion of them).

    Tom.

    • Yeah, it's not a new idea. In the book Dune they used little pumps inside their boots to run the circulation pumps of their stillsuits. They did have to put some sort of grease on their heels, or else it chafed something awful though.

  • killer app (Score:2, Interesting)

    by hexdef6 ( 141919 )
    If I remember correctly, there was a panel at Summercon 99 where Decius presented the concept for shoes like these as part of a presentation on a peculiar type of bio-encryption. His idea involved sending a security key to various objects (like a doorknob) via low power electricity oscillations sent across the skin. He suggested using piezo-electric generators in shoes as a power source.

    His idea was to use this system of information transmission to enable data-rich handshakes (using connected HUDs) among other things.

  • Trevor Baylis, of Wind Up Radio fame, is also working on this kind of technology. The approaches are pretty standard, and are ALL dependent on new materials which combine the ability to generate a current from flexing motion with a long lived flexibility to withstand many 100,000s of flexes over a number of years - often of highly variable force (walking vs running for example).
    At the moment the energy that can be created from these is tiny, roughly analagous to the energy created in a self winding watch mechanism pound for pound.
    This is going nowhere fast.
    • Took a bit of digging, but here's a URL:

      http://www.theelectricshoeco.com/

      I seem to remember him walking across some desert while wearing them, to prove a point or or raise money for a cause or something ...

  • Unforeseen dangers. (Score:3, Funny)

    by dinotrac ( 18304 ) on Monday October 15, 2001 @06:38AM (#2430058) Journal
    "Baby, when I kiss you, it makes my toes tingle."

    "Oh, John, John, I want...Wait a minute! Are you wearing those boots again?"

    "My feet were cold, hon. That's all. Cold feet. They don't mean a thing to me."

    "I knew it. You were kissing me, but you were thing of them. You've been running around on me. You heel. You're nothing but a leather whore"

    "No, baby, honest. It's not like that at all. Sure, the boots and me were an item once, but we're just friends now. C'mon, baby. Can't a guy have friends?"

    "You can have all the damned friends you want, John. I'm leaving you. Oh, and just so you'll know: I'm stopping by the shoe store on my way out."

    "No-o-o-o-o-o!!!!"

  • Old (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Smuttley ( 126014 )
    Trevor Baylis (inventor fo the clockwork radio) came up with this idea a few years back.

  • Parasitic power (Score:5, Informative)

    by joel.neely ( 165789 ) on Monday October 15, 2001 @06:43AM (#2430066)
    The good folks at the MIT Media Lab [mit.edu] (especially under the Things That Think [mit.edu] research program) have been researching such things for years.
    The July/August issue of IEEE Micro [computer.org] contains several articles on their work, including one on parasitic power [computer.org].
  • The wwearable computing crowd at MIT and University of Toronto have been working on this stuff for at least 3 years now. I remember seeing a prototype piezoelectric shoe generator at MIT in 1997. I believe the reasearch was done in the same lab as the PAN (personal Area Network) which allows data exchange through skin contact... AKA a handshake will transfer your business card to the other person's wearable computer.

    from what I read at the links this is either a product based on the MIt research or someone re-inventing the wheel.

  • There is only one problem with these boots. Most likely, only geeks would use something like this since regular people tend to be techno-phobes. Unless these shoes can charge a laptop battery on a trip to the soda machine, I don't think that most geeks (not all, just most) would walk around enough to charge anything :)

  • Previously Seen Story??? (Score:3, Informative)

    by Schwarzchild ( 225794 ) on Monday October 15, 2001 @06:54AM (#2430084)
    Seems as if we've done a story before on shoes that generate electricity...

    Hmm....maybe maybe not but /. has certainly previously posted a story on human generated power [slashdot.org].

  • Now i can attach a sound system to my feet to play pimping music while I strut down the street, about time.

  • Boot power technology (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Investigation of this goes back a long way, at least a few years. Work has definitely been done at QinetiQ on the subject. Check


    http://www.qinetiq.com/applications/qinetiq/news _r oom/news_releases/show.asp?ShowID=106&category=0


    Even very small amounts of power can be useful in particular circumstances.

  • I have been generating electricity by wearing my socks and walking on carpet for years! Of course, I lose it all when I touch a door handle...
  • What a great idea - but I'd be worried about how they'd behave in bad weather? Being a Canadian and all, they'd definitely have to be water, snow and salt resisitent. I wouldn't want to worry about getting electrocuted by my own footwear. I suppose the rubber soles would prevent that, but still...
  • ...solves power problem with U.S. Army Land
    Warrior program
  • The more power you generate from these boots, the harder walking becomes. I'm not sure I'd like to generate a few watts of power at the expense of lower back problems.
  • http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/10/20/044524 2&mode=flat
  • Just push it and it will... Er. Wait a minute. Dang, back to the drawing board.
  • They'll start running around whenever they need a little extra power. I can seriously see this as a huge motivator for people to excercise.
  • ... and Muad Dib will defeat the emperor ??

  • ok, so maybe its just me

    but after a 20 minutes fast walking my feet can generate enough 'gas' to power a small town (so people tell me)
  • But the funding is coming from a defense source. The primary application isn't cellphones and Walkmans and such. Soliders have to carry a significant load of batteries while on the march. The energies produced from these boots by marching could lessen this burden.
  • I remember more than a year ago MIT media lab working on strapped on comps powered by human movement doing financial transactions. retro it is...
  • Just imagine, while running during PE... a prankster with some new shoes could charge up a battery. Later, while in the locker room, he (or she possibly) could shock one of his buddies without having to be on a carpet. A kid with shoes like that could be the envy of the entire school! I think I've seen the Emperor zap Luke one too many times.
  • OK, here is an idea on how to "build" electric boots. I am giving it away free, to the public domain. Hell, it might already be patented, I don't know...

    Build a boot with a fairly rigid upper, or with a frame around the upper, in such a manner that there is a semi-flexible pivot and a fully flexible pivot around the ankle (in other words, make it flexible in the full range of motion of the ankle, but try to keep it mostly flexible in the "normal" direction of motion, in line with the rest of the leg.

    Around this pivot you would need a gear system, with maybe a ratchet and small flywheel system (like the baycomm radio), so that as the ankle flexes, the flywheel is spun at a high rate of speed. Perhaps even make it spring loaded, so that when standing still, or during mid-stride, the flywheel continues to run for a short while.

    Attach a small generator (one of those cheesy 3V motors would be perfect if made a bit more robust), and tap the power.

    Feasible? Sounds reasonable to me, though perhaps a little bulky - but I bet with good design, it could be slimmed down and made to work rather well...
  • There was an Italian soft-pron movie about 20 years ago that did the same sort of thing. Used special sensors placed under matresses, and generated power when the people in the bed, er, engaged in recreational activities.

    I'd be willing to fund research....

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