[Evodyne]

Terry,

Nice work! I'm an engineer and have done my share of technical/instructional manuals and I can be a bit picky. Honestly, you've done a great job breaking it down and explaining each step. Very professional. It's funny, but you said that once proficient that a person could whip through the steps in under two minutes. But isn't it amazing how long it takes to put together an explanation? Unfortunately for you, you took the plunge-now you've got to see it through. In all your spare time, right? Ha! I can't even remember what THAT'S like. O.K, have a great weekend. Just don't electrocute yourself once the rest of the magnets are in place...

Lance

[santiniuk]

Totally off topic

Today I was at the Gym and I was using a Cross trainer. After 15 minutes of slaving away I glanced down at the display panel.

I wasn't putting a hugh amount of effort in but enough.... Anyway I was generating about 15 - 20 Watts....

I couldn't help but grin to myself when I remembered your post Terry about Generating 10W with just one Magnet....

Oh well....... I reckon I need some Magnets

Great thread. Another 'Rainy day project......

[ChrisJ]

If this has already been posted, then sorry for the duplication.

Has anyone seen this new design for a wind turbine?

New Turbine Design

Chris

[Evodyne]

If this has already been posted, then sorry for the duplication.

Has anyone seen this new design for a wind turbine?

New Turbine Design

Chris

Looks to be a Darrieus rotor design-not new at all. For improvements to this design Goolgel the Turby and the Gorlov Turbine-both helical spin offs.

Lance

[MrBean]

Yes. There are a lot of variations of that design type. I know of a few people who are working on VAWT designs. I may even have a go once I get the one I'm building now, finished.

[JavaDog]

Looks to be a Darrieus rotor design-not new at all. For improvements to this design Goolgel the Turby and the Gorlov Turbine-both helical spin offs.

Lance

Lance, didn't know you were into power gen too! I'm over on Fieldlines all the time, although I am a Hydro freak (but wind gennies are still too cool).

[Evodyne]

Lance, didn't know you were into power gen too! I'm over on Fieldlines all the time, although I am a Hydro freak (but wind gennies are still too cool).

Interest in many things....master of none! Hi Joe. I need to "talk" to you; look for email later....

The wind thing is essentially the lure of free (once all the crud is installed and paid for ) power. I've got a good site and don't consume too much, so wind, along with some solar, could make a big difference. If I had a stream I'd be all over the hydro. Wind that never goes away! I really need to check out fieldlines...maybe you'll see me there. CNC finished???

Evodyne

[pcroxford]

I, too am a Wind gen freak, although I will be starting and finishing my cnc project before playing around with magnets.. I had also the idea of milling out molds for composite blades in sections. seems fully plausible. Right now the most cost prohibitive item with respect to home-grown wind power is the cost of the electronics. There ought to be someone out there who is willing to start an open source website supporting wind generation by publishing schematics, board and component layouts, etc for charge controllers and inverters. These are the the pricey bits. Of course nobody wants to be held liable for their design when it electrocutes someone... This seems like the sort of site that could bring such talent together.
I want to build a 2-3kW windmill like the one on www.otherpower.com. it looks soo easy!

[MrBean]

Not much progress to report just lately. I've had a few personal problems to get sorted out.

I have found time to write some more of the tutorial though.
It's almost done now, just a few finishing touches to add later.

http://www.homemade-wind-turbines.co.uk

I hope to have the machine up and flying in around 2 weeks time, hopefully with some initial test results figures.

Regards Terry.

[Evodyne]

Not much progress to report just lately. I've had a few personal problems to get sorted out

Terry, thats the story of my life! Life comes first, and you have to do what you have to do. Hopefully it's nothing serious. Keep your chin up. And thanks for the update on the tutorial...I'm going to pop over and take a peek shortly.

Evo

[MrBean]

Terry, thats the story of my life! Life comes first, and you have to do what you have to do.

Kids eh??

My little girl spent her first 6 weeks of life as a "Borg", and things have not gone so well for her. She has 2 extremely rare genetic disorders. Things come up from time to time and I get upset, have a few weeks of sitting about and thinking. Then I get on with things again.

So. To get back on topic.....

My magnet rotors are now cast in resin and are drying as I write this.
I've taken some photo's and will update the website when my camera batteries are charged enough to let me transfer the pictures.

I should get the other rotor cast today. Then I can get the alternator re-assembled and test the output with both of the rotors on the machine.

Not long now untill she's flying...


Regards Terry..

[MrBean]

Here's a couple of pics of the latest developments.

Both rotors are on the machine now. No pics of that bit yet. The stator is on and wired up too.

At present I'm getting 12V at 110 RPM, which may be a little early. I'm going to leave it set at that untill I can get it in the air for testing, then see how it goes.
It looks like the air gap is big enough to allow me room to close it up to get 24V cut-in. I'm still debating 12V or 24V.

Turning by hand. At ~200 RPM. I'm seeing 36 Watts into a 12V battery. I guess these figures don't mean too much untill it's got the blades on and is being driven by the wind.

I'm hoping to have the first real figures next weekend sometime.

Regards Terry..

[Evodyne]

That's looking good! As diameter changes the rpm needed for a given TSR varies. What was your design TSR, and if you get it, what rpm does that put you at? You ought to be able to estimate your power for that rpm based on the testing you've done up to this point. I'm looking foward to seeing number 2 "fly"! Keep up the good work.

Evo

[MrBean]

The design TSR is 7. However I have yet to make the "proper" blades.

If you recall.... My dad made a quick and basic set of blades that have no twist. They are 5 degrees for the full length.
These will be on the turbine for a while, untill I get time to CNC cut some proper TSR 7 blades, so untill then the figures will be whatever they are.

Ok, it's late here and I'm not sure I fully understand the question.

As diameter changes the rpm needed for a given TSR varies. What was your design TSR, and if you get it, what rpm does that put you at?

The design TSR is 7 for the final blades (1 metre radius), but the RPM will be dependant on the wind speed.

My cut-in speed at present is 110 RPM (for 12 Volts), which, in theory, means a 3.72 MPH wind. That's assuming no losses, (electrical or bearings etc...)
I have a feeling this is way too low for TSR 7. The alternator will probably stall a TSR 7 blade fairly early, but as I'm using the "basic" blades for now, and I have no idea of the TSR, I'm leaving it at 110 RPM cut-in. I have a feeling the basic blade is slower and has more torque than a TSR 7, so 110 RPM cut-in may be OK.

We'll see how it pans out.
Should be fun, if nothing else.

Terry.

[justCNCit]

they were doing experiments on the Swiss air generators on T.V., and apparently using NASA wind tunnels found that the only to build the perfect set of blades, ones that would not wear down easily, eliminate terbulence and get the most out of the wind were ones that could respond to upcoming wind forces of direction and speed.

Different areas of the blade would need to respond in different ways, pivoting the blades wouldn't fix the problem completely.

My prediction is that they will engineer blades when technology has been devellopped past what we currently have and it will be easy to change the angles across the sweep of the blade as it is in motion, in reponse to up and coming wind forces as forecasted by the software system.

As for what you can do in all practicality, I have no idea.

[whirlybomber]

going waaaay back in this thread.....

you were talking about using liquid expanding foam to make blanks to then cut blade cores from. You could try a different way.

First, make a set of negative moulds of the core shape, that you can finish and coat with a release agent (wax, freekote, zyvax, whatever) and bolt together.

Next, get a bunch of your favorite fibre reinforcements (glass, carbon, string, fishing line or whatever) and run them from tip to root. you would probably want to clamp them at the tip end to stop them moving about.

At the root end, extend them past the end of the mould, and hook them over some sort of spacer, so as they come from the tip to the root, they are spaced out through the volume of the blade.

mount the whole setup vertically, with tip end down.

pour in foam mixture, holding the fibres in slight tension until the foam sets hard.

Demould the whole thing and wrap with glass cloth as per usual.

Or, you could just line the mould cavity with glass cloth to begin with, and pour the foam into that....

Anyway, just a thought.

cheers,
Brad

[Weldtutor]

These photos are from the Erie Shores Wind Farm.

It is currently under construction, consisting of 66 units, near Port Burwell Ontario Canada, on the north shore of Lake Erie.

Towers are 360' tall, each blade is 112' long.

[bcdracing]

hey Alex Morgan here.
hope you daughter is doing good.
i have been praying for her.

you sent me your cad files for blades.
i am still working on getting power to my mill.
just thought I'd say hey.

[Netjams]

Very cool!

By the way I find the BIG stepper motors make great wind turbine generators

[diarmaid]

PHEW! That was some read. Hi folks. I've been interested in making a wind turbine now for a long while, and hopefully will get around to it next year. No posts from Terry in a while and his site is gone, anyone have any ideas?
Terry, if your still using the zone I hope your daughter is ok m8.

I have some questions that someone might be able to help me with!

Most people seem to use either 12, 24, or 48 V battery banks. But household power is either approx 110V or 220V. Why not use 10 or 20 bty's to get a 110V or 220V bty bank?

And if you did use that many would you get enough voltage from your turbine alternator to charge them?

If only using 2 bty's for a 24V system, will 2 x 12V bty's be able to output 220V 13Amps for household appliances?

Could you use 2 x 24V btys and connect them in parallel instead of series to give you larger storage capacity without increasing your voltage to 48V?

If so, how would you charge the two seperate sets....possibly a parallel offshoot from the alternator outputs, but would that not halve the voltage into each bty for charging?

Sorry for all the questions but the electronics is my hardest part when I eventually get around to this.

Thanks folks,
L8rs.