My First Big Erection

[Shadow]

I finally got my 40 foot, 3 legged Wincharger Tower built  with swivel legs and anchors cemented in.I've raised and lowered it about 5 times with no problems. Today was first time with Wind turbine attached.

It went up perfect!

I use two tires to absorb the impact but one tire would probably do.

The best wind we saw today was about 12 miles an hour but I was seeing 9-10 amps at 51 volts! I was very pleased so far. However I have the extension pipe up at 6 feet over the tower, in gusty winds that seems to rock the top of the tower too much, so I will lower it about 2 feet to get the weight down closer to the tower. I also for to put a clamp on top where the cable comes through the pipe so I have the weight of the cable pulling on my stator, not good.

 We are situated in a huge valley, although quite high up on the side, we get lots of wind throughout the whole valley, so should be good.Today seemed to cap off a very satisfying journey of bulding your Wind turbine from scratch, then seeing it rise up to meet the wind and gracefully start turning. I'm gonna have one stiff neck tomorrow!

[wpowokal]

Wow greate lookin site, hope you solve your erection problems, there are pills for that you know,(allan snigers sorry could not help myself)

allan down under

[stevesteve]

I'm green with envy. My plot in the UK is small and if I put up an Eiffel Tower lookalike the neighbours would have something to say about it !

Your power bills should certainly take a hit with that thing running.

[Experimental]

     Hi Shadow,

    That,s the most "useful erection", I,ve seen all morning!!!

   Really looks great and I,m curious, did you use the drive shaft idea ??

   Was also looking at the top, where you said, you were going to lower the support pipe -- won,t that put your blades, dangerously close to the tower ??

   Perhaps you could just add a larger pipe, part way up the original....

   Anyway , really nice -- wish I had one just like it!!!  Bill H..

[Shadow]

Thanks Bill, I didnt use the driveshafts, but I did use driveshaft yokes with solid pins going through for the back legs to pivot on. I dug the holes just over 3 feet deep,then belled out the bottom so top of hole was about 12 inches wide and bottom was about 18 inches. Then I took 6 foot steel posts and drove them downinto the hole above 4 more feet. Then right beside them I had some heavy Iron, not sure what it was used for but it was 'S' shaped,I attached it to the steel post with some old logging chain. I then attached 3 or 4 cultivator shovels to this apparatus.I also put in a seperate post with an eye hole on top to attach a safety chain to each leg. Then all the holes were filled with cement.The back legs pivot in 4 inch channel Iron. The front leg sits in channel iron and gets bolted down.

           I can lower the top pipe at least a foot, maybe two without running into a clearance problem I think.I wonder what the minimun clearance should be for 70 inch laminated cedar blades?They dont seem to flex much, but in a 60 mile an hour wind? Also today I'm pounding in a couple steel rods (5/8 inch by 5 feet) into the ground for ground rods.I'm wonder what size cable to use for a ground cable? I have old welding cable, booster cables,Will something like that be enough?

[electrondady1]

 great work shadow!

[wpowokal]

Shadow, in your 4th pic there seems to be a tower on the horizon, is this a comms tower?

allan down under

[Shadow]

Yep, Communication Tower. There are 4 of them within about 5 miles all around 500 feet tall. I wonder if they'd notice if I put a wind turbine on one of them?

[Experimental]

    Hey Shadow,

    I have aquired a book on lightning protection -- in it , it recommends, at least #4 cable , for ground strap !!

    But also says, if you change direction, such as 90 degrees, curve the ground straps at a curvature of no less than a basketball !!

   Evedentally, the lightning charge will follow, such a curve, but will jump out of sharp curves, and arc !!

   Other than that, the steel rod, should be fine -- but electrical suppliers, even some hardware stores, carry a copper  clad rod, or zink coated rods, for this purpose..( better conductivity)

   In your home, cabin, whatever -- all, incomeing power cables, appliances (inverters) should all be grounded to a copper bus bar, then one large cable going to one central ground rod -- and again, that grounding cable, should make no sharp turns, so the current is carried to the ground rod.. ( this is to protect your equipment, from transient charges)

   IT also recommends, two bolt connections on the ground strap, not just one, and if possiable, actually welded to the bus bar, or tower legs..I was supprised to find one old ground cable, Bonded, by some form of welding, to a aluminum tower I aquired !!

    This book, is for protection of very expensive electronics, in towers, and repeter stations-- so it,s pretty extensive info -- perhaps, overkill -- but I would rather be -- OVER, than under, when it comes to lightning !!!

    Hope this is helpful info, for yourself and others, And again, very nice job,   Bill H...

   

[johnlm]

He had it up 5 times, but if it was up for more than 4 hours at a time he might seek a doctors advice.  Sorry I just had to comment also.

Johnlm

[richhagen]

Looks great Shadow!  Sounds like pretty good power generation.  It looks like your out on the plains somewhere, so I'm guessing you'll get good wind.  Looks like you are having a lot of fun, and that is great.  Rich Hagen

[Ungrounded Lightning Rod]

I have aquired a book on lightning protection -- in it , it recommends, at least #4 cable , for ground strap !!  But also says, if you change direction, such as 90 degrees, curve the ground straps at a curvature of no less than a basketball !!  Evedentally, the lightning charge will follow, such a curve, but will jump out of sharp curves, and arc !!

Yep.  That's dead on.

Tight curves have inductance, a lot more than gentle curves.  Lightning currents start and stop very abruptly, which correpsonds to a lot of high-frequency energy.  So even a LITTLE inductance in your wire and it would rather jump through the air to something else.

That's why you put a lightning arrester on your antenna cable just before it goes through the wall (keeping things straight or gently-curved from the antenna to the arrester and the arrester to the ground rod), then put a rather tight J-shaped loop in the cable just below the arrester as it goes into the wall (sorta like the trap under your sink, but a bit smaller).  The "drip loop" makes the lightning reluctant to go through the wall, increasing the fraction that goes to ground through the arrester and greatly reducing the amount that goes into the house and tries to kill your radio or TV.

(It's called a "drip loop" because it also leads the rain down to the bottom of the loop where it falls off, rather than following the wire into the wall and rotting the house.)

This high-frequency equivalence also makes the lightning tend to travel mostly on the SURFACE of the wire.  (It's called the "skin effect", and it's why you can take hits from a tesla coil on a conductor you're holding and have the current go through your body without even noticing it.  Good if you're hit by lightning - because most of it doesn't go through the core of your body, which is why lightning-strike victims often survive rather than exploding.)

This means you want your wire extra thick.  (If you look at the ground "wire" on older farmhouse lightning arresters you'll notice that they tend to have a squared-off cross-section that twists a bit so the edges are a gentle helix.  This is to put just enough inductance in the surface so more of the lightning current goes into the core of the wire, evening the heating and increasing its carrying capacity - but not enough that the lightning gives up and goes somewhere else - like down the chimbney and across the living room.)