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Genuine question: if we're in a collapse scenario that is so devastating to the global supply chain that we're scavenging microcontrollers, how do we generate e

Genuine question: if we're in a collapse scenario that is so devastating to the global supply chain that we're scavenging microcontrollers, how do we generate electricity to power them? Solar panels and batteries don't last forever and would presumably require the same or similar supply chain as the microcontrollers. This is a cool project regardless, but in such a catastrophic scenario it seems easier to just give up on computing and go back to more primitive technology. If I can't get a single thing delivered, I see myself collecting rainwater and gardening, not compiling Forth to an old Z80.

smaddox 6y ago
Building/refurbishing lead acid batteries wouldn't be all that difficult immediately post collapse. Solar panels can also be refurbished. For poly silicon cells, it's mostly the contacts that degrade, and you can improve that with a soldering iron. A bit more work, but still doable, would be a forming gas anneal, which can additionally passivate defects.
- NegativeLatency 6y ago
  I suspect you could scrounge materials for a nickel iron battery without too much trouble.
Anarch157a 6y ago
You can scavenge car's alternators and use a water wheel or windmill to turn it. Alternators can work for a decade with minimum maintenance. Just have five or six stashed, just in case. They can supply 40A at 12V, or using a transformer to up the voltage, 4A at 120V.
- emteycz 6y ago
  Alternators are also trivial to build by hand.
  - mauvehaus 6y ago
    Sure. If you have the input materials. If you're at the point of having to build an alternator by hand rather than just taking one off a car, I'd like to know where you're getting magnet wire, the machined shaft, the various rotor and stator parts, the end-bells, and the ball bearings.
    - emteycz 6y ago
      Consider that you're not necessarily building from raw materials, you will be repurposing things you find around. Finding an alternator probably won't be a problem in the populated areas of USA but might be elsewhere - thankfully building it is still sufficiently simple.
- throwaway316943 6y ago
  Have you successfully run any modern hardware off of the irregular current coming out of something like that? You could charge batteries off of an alternator with a voltage regulator but I doubt any modern electronics are going to work well on current supplied by a jerry rigged water wheel and step up transformer. You’d be reliant on a lot of ICs to do it properly at a small scale.
  - cturner 6y ago
    Would it be viable to use a rig of leyden jars to smooth out power coming from a scrappy alternator/commutator, and to implement cut-outs?
analyte123 6y ago
There are lots of ways to generate electricity. You can build a bicycle dynamo or a wood burning steam turbine pretty easily. People had wind turbines charging batteries a hundred years ago.
JamesLeonis 6y ago
Rather than a total and permanent collapse, instead imagine a large-scale supply shock. Governments and institutions can access parts but consumers are rationed out of the supply chain for a while. Thailand's tsunami knocked out hard drive manufacturing back in 2011 [0], and crypto-tokens have persistently strained graphics card supplies for several years recently [1]. [0]: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/oct/25/thailand-floods-hard-drive-shortage https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/oct/25/thailand-... [1]: https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2021/01/06/bad-news-graphics-card-prices-are-skyrocketing-and-theres-no-end-in-sight https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2021/01/06/bad-news-gr...
crocodiletears 6y ago
In most reasonable collapse scenarios I could imagine, energy isn't so much a technological concern as it might be a political concern. Slightly scarcer perhaps, but there's a ubiquity of old alternators, plenty of shit to burn, and I guarantee the extractive industries will be among the first to come online, if they ever went out in the first place, and can be coaxed to function in a degraded state without globalized supply chains or too much esoteric knowledge. Computers are much more difficult to bring back: much of their manufacture and distribution is highly dependent on a globalized supply chain, which in turn is dependent on the security guarantees of an international order backed by military force. Many of their parts are proprietary by nature, and individual components can at their simplest require rare expertise in multiple niche fields of science before their production can even be considered.
- pjc50 6y ago
  > energy isn't so much a technological concern as it might be a political concern This is what irks me about these kinds of "collapse fantasy". Somebody described the apocalypse novels of John Wyndham (Day of the Triffids etc) as "cosy catastrophe", and that very much applies here. The laser focus on technological detail-hoarding while having blinders on to any consideration of the politics of the situation, or what might be called "material conditions". Historically few societies collapsed without external pressure. Societies do not collapse, they are collapsed. And the force that's doing the collapsing is the thing you need to worry about. It also can take a very long time to wane; while Rome may have split from the Roman Empire in 395, the eastern successor Holy Roman Empire lasted until 1806. And the microstates provide even weirder examples, like the Maltese feudal knights with a WW2 air force!
  - Guthur 6y ago
    Yeah, the brief thinking I've ever done about the collapse in these scenarios is to potentially band together with some like minded friends and try to setup some subsistence group with hunting, light farming and security. Firearms are highly regulated where I am from which makes the first and last a little more difficult than they potentially could be. I really never gave it that much thought to be perfectly frank. Though the point is I feel semi conductors are pretty far down the order of priorities.
hyperion2010 6y ago
Singer foot pedal sewing machine style power for electronics would be one possibility. Of course those would have to be scavenged too given the lack of skilled blacksmiths these days.
- layoutIfNeeded 6y ago
  A top male athlete can sustain 500W power for an hour. I wouldn't have high hopes for your sewing machine generator.
pratik661 6y ago
This doesn't really need to be hypothetical. There are plenty of contemporary and recent examples of countries experiencing collapse: Syria + Libya in the 2010s, Yemen now, etc.
JoeyBananas 6y ago
microcontrollers are very low power because they are designed to run on batteries

smaddox 6y ago

Building/refurbishing lead acid batteries wouldn't be all that difficult immediately post collapse. Solar panels can also be refurbished. For poly silicon cells, it's mostly the contacts that degrade, and you can improve that with a soldering iron. A bit more work, but still doable, would be a forming gas anneal, which can additionally passivate defects.

NegativeLatency 6y ago
I suspect you could scrounge materials for a nickel iron battery without too much trouble.

Anarch157a 6y ago

You can scavenge car's alternators and use a water wheel or windmill to turn it. Alternators can work for a decade with minimum maintenance. Just have five or six stashed, just in case. They can supply 40A at 12V, or using a transformer to up the voltage, 4A at 120V.

emteycz 6y ago
Alternators are also trivial to build by hand.
- mauvehaus 6y ago
  Sure. If you have the input materials. If you're at the point of having to build an alternator by hand rather than just taking one off a car, I'd like to know where you're getting magnet wire, the machined shaft, the various rotor and stator parts, the end-bells, and the ball bearings.
  - emteycz 6y ago
    Consider that you're not necessarily building from raw materials, you will be repurposing things you find around. Finding an alternator probably won't be a problem in the populated areas of USA but might be elsewhere - thankfully building it is still sufficiently simple.
throwaway316943 6y ago
Have you successfully run any modern hardware off of the irregular current coming out of something like that? You could charge batteries off of an alternator with a voltage regulator but I doubt any modern electronics are going to work well on current supplied by a jerry rigged water wheel and step up transformer. You’d be reliant on a lot of ICs to do it properly at a small scale.
- cturner 6y ago
  Would it be viable to use a rig of leyden jars to smooth out power coming from a scrappy alternator/commutator, and to implement cut-outs?

analyte123 6y ago

There are lots of ways to generate electricity. You can build a bicycle dynamo or a wood burning steam turbine pretty easily. People had wind turbines charging batteries a hundred years ago.

JamesLeonis 6y ago

Rather than a total and permanent collapse, instead imagine a large-scale supply shock. Governments and institutions can access parts but consumers are rationed out of the supply chain for a while. Thailand's tsunami knocked out hard drive manufacturing back in 2011 [0], and crypto-tokens have persistently strained graphics card supplies for several years recently [1]. [0]: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/oct/25/thailand-floods-hard-drive-shortage https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/oct/25/thailand-... [1]: https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2021/01/06/bad-news-graphics-card-prices-are-skyrocketing-and-theres-no-end-in-sight https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2021/01/06/bad-news-gr...

crocodiletears 6y ago

In most reasonable collapse scenarios I could imagine, energy isn't so much a technological concern as it might be a political concern. Slightly scarcer perhaps, but there's a ubiquity of old alternators, plenty of shit to burn, and I guarantee the extractive industries will be among the first to come online, if they ever went out in the first place, and can be coaxed to function in a degraded state without globalized supply chains or too much esoteric knowledge. Computers are much more difficult to bring back: much of their manufacture and distribution is highly dependent on a globalized supply chain, which in turn is dependent on the security guarantees of an international order backed by military force. Many of their parts are proprietary by nature, and individual components can at their simplest require rare expertise in multiple niche fields of science before their production can even be considered.

pjc50 6y ago
> energy isn't so much a technological concern as it might be a political concern This is what irks me about these kinds of "collapse fantasy". Somebody described the apocalypse novels of John Wyndham (Day of the Triffids etc) as "cosy catastrophe", and that very much applies here. The laser focus on technological detail-hoarding while having blinders on to any consideration of the politics of the situation, or what might be called "material conditions". Historically few societies collapsed without external pressure. Societies do not collapse, they are collapsed. And the force that's doing the collapsing is the thing you need to worry about. It also can take a very long time to wane; while Rome may have split from the Roman Empire in 395, the eastern successor Holy Roman Empire lasted until 1806. And the microstates provide even weirder examples, like the Maltese feudal knights with a WW2 air force!
- Guthur 6y ago
  Yeah, the brief thinking I've ever done about the collapse in these scenarios is to potentially band together with some like minded friends and try to setup some subsistence group with hunting, light farming and security. Firearms are highly regulated where I am from which makes the first and last a little more difficult than they potentially could be. I really never gave it that much thought to be perfectly frank. Though the point is I feel semi conductors are pretty far down the order of priorities.

hyperion2010 6y ago

Singer foot pedal sewing machine style power for electronics would be one possibility. Of course those would have to be scavenged too given the lack of skilled blacksmiths these days.

layoutIfNeeded 6y ago
A top male athlete can sustain 500W power for an hour. I wouldn't have high hopes for your sewing machine generator.

pratik661 6y ago

This doesn't really need to be hypothetical. There are plenty of contemporary and recent examples of countries experiencing collapse: Syria + Libya in the 2010s, Yemen now, etc.

JoeyBananas 6y ago

microcontrollers are very low power because they are designed to run on batteries