New P.V.C pipe Vawt up and spinning

[gotwind2]

A little out of balance, but starts easily, and difficult to stop the 5/8th" bike hub shaft with fingers, when spinning in a 10 mph wind.

The bottom disc is wood, at the moment just for testing, but it will be a 11" diameter 1/4" thick steel disc.

I now need to design a suitable 12v coil/magnet setup,with a cut in of maybe 120 rpm to get the desired 10w trickle charge, I might, no, I will need some help with this part please. i.e best configuration, for a single rotor design.

Video here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fLKavEd3WgA

b.t.w it has cost me £2($4) so far.....

Cheers

Ben.

[Nando]

You may need lower CUT in, around 60-80 RPM.

You should measure the torque to define what generator is required.

Nando

[mukunthko]

Nice. Looks good. What bearings have you used on this one? I'm thinking about a Darieus Turbine using PVC blades. Has anyone in the board tried it so far?

[gotwind2]

A simple bicycle front wheel hub and bearing mukunthko, cheap and strong.

Yes, maybe 60-80 rpm cut in would be wise.

ben

[gotwind2]

There is a Company in the U.K that sells a very similar product, by my calculations it looks like a 20w unit, and looks very home built.

It sells for £300 ($600), I'm sure I can make one for a tenth of that price.

http://www.envirotekpower.co.uk/page2.html

[tecker]

A small unit has some uses .I see that EV caters to Coastal areas . The Savonous Vawt rarely gets out of control making it a good bad weather choice. Low wind startup under

load makes the controller a must. The bearing takes a beating so some grease fittings are a good idea .You can integrate the motor bearings with a good choice on your Gen set. All in all several of these at set at good wind vectors or along DC transmission lines makes good sense . I like top and bottom bearings but the frestanding looks very cool  

[gotwind2]

Yes tecker.

Also good for more built up areas, where turbulent air would 'upset' a horizontal gen.

I am struggling to find information here on building a suitable alternator. I've searched the board thoroughly.

To recap,

single rotor design (up to 11" diameter area available)

12v Cutin at between 60-80 rpm

If I could get 1 amp output from it I would be happy, it is obviously do-able, as they are available commercially. See above

I need suggestions on number of magnets/coils

Wire thickness and number of turns to get me started.

Cheers

Ben

[electrondady1]

thanks for the video gotwind .

there are lots of other videos to go to as well . cool to see them spin.

 in canada, for no real reason, the oil companys just whacked us with a large price increase.

 your little savonius has hydrogen generator written all over it !

i have been experimenting with geting a charging voltage from such low rpm for a while.

consider a geni configuration that ues all the mags per phase.

[tecker]

I've got some data but mabe a new approach and a new direction will be a good idea here . Your not locked into any one idea so you might get ahead of the problems .I'll watch with great intrest Carry on .

[tecker]

I'll update My Vawts sometime this weekend a Four tier 15" and a start on my 36" two tier (probably three in the end) .

[PHinker]

Check out the posts by Ed Lenz (windstuffnow on this board) and his website (www.windstuffnow.com).  He's done a number of single rotor alts for his various projects.  He has several 8" single rotor, air core alts which you might be able to scale up for your project.

[gotwind2]

Wow,

He has some amazing projects there, and so many of them.

His work puts my efforts to shame...

Ben

[CG]

Ben,

Is that 4 footer with the soil pipe blades going backwards? The reason I ask is that there is a video of a Windsave turbine on yahoo(not your post on youtube), and that seems to me that it is going backwards, and I am beginning to wonder if I am interpretting these videos correctly. How have you got the 4 footer's blades reinforced at the root, they will take a bit of stick there, and getting the turbine to furl would extend its life span. What I wouldn't give of a off the shelf 100-150w PMA, bet I would have to go to China for that, though.

[tecker]

I had the same reaction to the video but I think they designed them to use the tapered lift (poor man books ) .It seems the cord is factored out of the power fuction and is just following along .If the lift is on the cord you would increase the area of lift.

[CG]

Tecker,

If you visit Ben's site you will see that the 4 footer, which he sells plans for, is ment to turn anticlockwise, looking at it from the front, the  blade fixings are biased towards the straight edge, this must be the leading edge. My gutter blades (see my posting under that title) are symetric and can be pitched to turn either way. But the type Ben makes commits you to one way of turning.