science fair project january2006

[picmacmillan]

2 highschool students from northern ontario Canada,are undertaking a very ambitious project and will be building a Wind Turbine capable of producing over 500 watts in very low winds and peak at over 1000 watts in moderate winds. This wind turbine will be built using as much recycled material as possible and will use wind power which is becoming a very attractive alternative to the rising energy costs of electricity.

-We will be building a 12 volt machine that will be 3 phase.

-We will have 4 coils per phase consisting of 33 turns of #14 magnet wire, with 2 strands of wire in each of the 12 coils.

-The stator will be 16" in diameter and will be 1/2" thick.

-We will be using 32 magnets total(16 per plate), puchased from wondermagnet.com(our hosts here )the size of the magnets are 2"x1"x1/2".

* I will get into the rest of the parts and the details as we get to that particular stage of the process. I have built 2 machines prior very similar and i have seen over 1000 watts at times and this machine takes care of the electricity requirements at my northern ontario property. I am very happy with the machines output and its overall mechanical stability.

so here goes with some pics and what we are trying to accomplish. The boys are doing all the work, and i am just supervising and it is very enjoyable to pass on what i have learned on this site. Thank you to all who have gotten me to the stage of being able to help others like i have been helped. Your time was and is always appreciated. It is what makes this site a true gem on the worldwide web for sure.

The first thing we did was to make a coil winder. We used the exact model that is in Hugh Piggots book(available here by our hosts). I did change the inside piece a bit and made it go to a point so we could get our coils into our stator size. We lose a bit of power to cancellation, but i have found it works real well anyhow.

I like to use a bit of glue here and there from a hot glue gun. I find it helps to keep the coils together while i try to put some electrical tape on them once they are taken out of the coil winder. I also made a cardboard cutout of the exact size of my stator. I then made cardboard shaped coils and drew in all my lines where the magnets should sit, and the exact position of where the coils will sit. The hole in coil should be the same size of the magnet you are using(or close anyway).

I also use ordinary boat fiberglass(resin), and mix in some baby powder to make the fiberglass resin go farther.. i think i use about 2 contatiners of baby powder for each stator.

the only other thing we did on day one was to cut out 2 pieces of fiberglass  to put in the stator mold. One piece to cover the top of the coils and 1 piece to cover the bottom. lots of fun

[Waterfront]

Hey!

Looking nice so far!! Regarding the last picture, with the fiberglass and the baby powder, I suppose you mixed some baby powder in with the resin?? How did that work out?

I read on a few of DanB's experiment pages at otherpower.com that he mixed in talc so he'd get some more volume overall with the same amount of resin, but I've always been hesitant to try that, I don't know, I just feel like it could screw up the resin or something...

But since that's the brand of fiberglass I usually get at homehardware, I wanted to ask somebody who had tried...

thanks,

[picmacmillan]

the baby powder is a definate plus...it works great and it not only makes the expensive fiberglass go alot further(because we add 2 containers of baby powder per stator), but it seems to make the stator more solid. i have built 3 like this now, and i have yet to have one crack or have any defects of any kind..

.   the picture there shows a magnet rotor we used before..it is show just for illustration purposes of the baby powder and the fiberglass resin we use...

   i would also like to say we use 2 pieces of fiberglass matt,and we use grease(any kind will do), to put all over the mold so it doesnt stick when done...the grease allows your stator to relase from the mold pretty easy...

    one more tip...i screw the mold together, the lid, the center and the bottom, but what i have found is sometimes resin will harden in the screw holes...a tip would be to fill the screw holes with some grease also so the resin cant harden, or even scrape some bar soap in the screw head...i have heard gardeners rub soap under their fingernails when gardening to prevent dirt from getting under their nails...when they are done, the just remove the bar soap from under their nails, and get on with the day...same could be done here to be able to remove the screws easily...

     one last thing i may do to improve even more is take danb's tip ...he uses some acrylic latex paint and adds some of this to his stator fiberglass...that is that real nice color he gets his stators to turn into...i believe he said he uses 2% paint to his fiberglass mixture to acheive the nice coloured stator...always room for improvement here....anyone with any other tips for this? their ideas are more than welcome here....pickster

[dinges]

I didn't know baby powder (=talcum powder?) worked. I know that in glider maintenance, glass balloons (trade name 'micro balloons') are used to mix in the epoxy. This drastically reduces density, shrinkage and amount of epoxy needed. You could make the mix as viscous as you wanted. The price was not so nice, but I remember holding a 1 litre-bag of the stuff and it weighed almost nothing.

But for applications where weight doesn't matter (much), talcum powder may be a good solution. Will remember this one! Plus a bit of paint, of course.

For mould release, I use some vaseline (from a big jar I have standing on my desk; why is that anytime I have a visitor in the workshop, I get comments about that jar ;-) ) Officially you should use poly-vinyl alcohol and wax (the PVA forms a very thin film, easy to release) but for me vaseline works just as well.

Peter,

The Netherlands.

[willib]

why oh why would you use anything but round coils when you have round magnets?

you could save on resistance by changing to round coils .

just an observation

have fun and enjoy , but consider changing to round coils.

[Waterfront]

2nd paragraph of his comment

.   the picture there shows a magnet rotor we used before..it is show just for illustration purposes of the baby powder and the fiberglass resin we use...

he's not actually using round magnets...

[Waterfront]

Allright, I'll give that baby powder a try, I'm desperate to get that resin cost down! So, 2 bottles per stator? hmm... how big's the stator? hehe. Or I should say, how much per volume? half/half? If you could give me the proportion you usually mix I'd be most appreciative...

Thanks

[willib]

oh lol, oops ! nevermind~

[picmacmillan]

ya, sorry for the picture of the round magnet palte...i didnt have a picture yet of the 2" mags as we havent completed that stage(next week), of the project...it was just an illustration of the brand of fiberglass we use( the other bondo stuff is no good to use) this stuff is real nice to work with...

 ..also for the other question....  our stator is 16" diameter and 1/2" thick...we mix in 1 can of fiberglass resin(size shown in picture), and 1 bottle of baby powder..

   mix in the baby powder(talcum is the same stuff just different name for it)...so the mixture we use is 1 can of fiberglass resin, one bottle of baby powder... for our stator size we mix up another 1/2 can of fiberglass resin, and another 1/2 container of baby powder(as shown in the photo....) this is more than enough ..

   for the grease we use to help with the stator release when done, i use axle grease, or dielectric grease(anything will do)..pickster

[willib]

i have wound many a coil using icewater to cool the resin so it stays liquid longer .

Not in the mixture of course , but around the outside of the container which contains the mixture..

[nothing to lose]

Hi Pic,

It's great that you are helping the kids build such a big project. Best of luck, hope everything goes well. You do great work, I am sure this will be a great success for the kids with your help.

Don't let any one put mags in their front pockets though

Saw the other post.

Things got a bit rough here and I got stuck home for the holidays, did you get my last e-mails? I hope to get on the road sometime after New Years.

Good luck, best wishes, and Merry Christmas to you and the family.

[Shadow]

I made my stator mould and coil winder etc out of 'Puckboard' I stopped at the local hockey rink and they gave me 2 pieces each 4 foot by 4 foot 1/2 inch thick.Its indestructable and resin wont stick to it. It makes a nice 1/2 inch thick stator.I noticed it was exactly the same thickness as my magnets, so I used pieces of it to pre-set my air gap before installing the outer rotor. I use it for everything now.

[ghurd]

Looks like you Canadians take your science fairs more serious than people around here do!

G-

[picmacmillan]

no ntl i didnt get the last email? my computer was down(again), so i had to delete my good emails with the 142 spam ones....call me in windsor or in the north,, i will call you back..lv your number again as it is up north and i'm not i will be in windsor until the 3rd of january

[picmacmillan]

hio ghurd , ya since our hockey game moved south we have to keep busy at something lol happy holidays all

[ghurd]

Pickster, You know where you live is too cold when the hockey team moves south!

Happy New Year!

[ghurd]

Could you clarify the magnets used?

Why the change?

I'm quite tired, but they look different than earlier.

G-

[picmacmillan]

hi ghurd...in this project we will be using forcefields 2"x1"x1/2" magnets, the ones pictured arent the noes e are using, jsut used that photo above for illustration of fiberglass...we are going to use 16 magnets per plate for a total of 32 that will be in the post in the next week or so..take care ghurd pickster

[nothing to lose]

Sorry to hear of computer problems.

I been wanting to call, but I am seldom at the house durring decent calling hours, don't think you want 2am calls

 I have the AT&T unlimited long distance for USA and added Canada for the extra $5 a month, no problem calling other than the times I am home are generally not good.

 You know how it is, I can call my ISP from any phone, and use many computers, but seldom home when doing it.

I just sent another e-mail tonight short time ago. Need Bob's number too, lost it, wife finnaly cleaned her desk this year, right when I left a paper laying on it

I been enjoying your posts recently, glad things are going so well with the students and the genny project. Looks like you'll be getting a real powerfull one built for them when it is all finished. Looks really good too.

 Well you can e-mail me at either address, the one you had already and I normally use, or the one shown on the forum here.