What was the name of Michael Faraday's first electric generator?

Michael Faraday’s first electric generator was called Faraday’s disk, also known as the Faraday wheel.

Faraday developed it in 1831 while investigating the relationship between electricity and magnetism. The device used a copper disk rotating between the poles of a horseshoe magnet. As the disk moved through the magnetic field, an electric current was produced and collected through sliding electrical contacts.

The machine was a homopolar generator, meaning it generated direct current without the commutators used in many later dynamos. Its electrical output was small and inefficient, so it was not a practical power station. Its importance was conceptual and experimental: it demonstrated that mechanical motion through a magnetic field could continuously produce electricity.

The Faraday disk is sometimes confused with an induction coil, alternator, or dynamo. An induction coil transforms changing current into high-voltage pulses, while an alternator produces alternating current. “Dynamo” is a broader name for later electric generators, especially those designed for useful power production. Faraday’s disk was the pioneering machine that helped establish the operating principle behind them.