Alvin,

I live near an Amish community. They are required to use lights on
their horse drawn buggies at night. They use 12V marine batteries
which last about 7 to 10 hours. Then they have the non-Amish
neighbors charge them, or use a gas generator. I was talking to one
of them and he said he would like to connect a car alternator to the
wheels.

I don't know much about the Amish, but I thought the idea was to avoid
modern technology? Couldn't they use lanterns as was done before electrical
lights were available?

Otherwise, I'd start with a switch to more efficient lighting so the
battery lasts longer.

I don't know if they still make them, but once upon a time you could get
lights for bicycles that were powered by a little generator that ran on the
top of the bike tire. Seems like it would be easy to adapt to a buggy.

Otherwise, maybe you could install a small gas powered generator? A hybrid
buggy?

But it seems like it's getting away from the Amish ideals to me?

Anthony