Anemometer II

[willib]

Thanks peter

after a lot of thought i finally installed a yaw bearing on the anemometer

so now it swivels as easy as pie

i used the chrome cover from another powersupply fan, to hold the 'tail'

i didnt think the chrome plated wire would break so easily when i bent it.





so i had to use another one , which i annealed before bending

the tail is held on with 10-32 threaded rod, and a couple of nuts.





the two bearings i used fit the pipe almost perfectly on the OD, and also fit a 5/16 brass  bolt with the ID .

so soon i will have some blade data

like wind speed vs. power out , as it seems good enough for china magnet it should be good enough for me.

[s4w2099]

wow willib you always amaze me with your projects. You sure are very ingenious.

:-D

[s4w2099]

forgot to ask. How do you fight the fan's cogging ?

[willib]

What cogging?

it dosnt cogg.

once you remove the armature there is nothing to cogg against

[gizmo]

I cant believe you drilled a hole throught a Need for Speed CD! Sacraledge!

I built a anemometer with a PS fan motor once, works good once you get over the start wind speed. Dont do as I did and stick it out the car window at 100kmh, screams like crazy and 500 plus volts!

Glenn

[Norm]

Yes ....He really should have used an AOL disk

              ( :>) Norm.

[TomW]

Glenn;

I totally agree, especially with the 7 or 8 billion AOL teaser CDs out there. Not to mention the coasters I made learning how to burn them properly before everyone had one built in the machine...

Cheers.

TomW

[s4w2099]

nice. I will try to make one myself.

:-D

[willib]

yeah ya got to take the armature out , but not the hall switch or the magnet or the circuit board because ya need that

as the magnet turns it flips the hall switch on and off

the hall switch in turn switches some fets on and off

and if you tap into the drain of one of the fets you will get a squarewave with the amplitude of your power source , ie use 5V to power your anemometer you get a five volt squarewave out.

[dinges]

Willib,

Yep. It will surely point in the wind from now on.

Thank you for making my day ! Sorry but I am still recovering from the laughter.

"After a lot of thought [...]"  

Yeah sure...

At least it was expedient to use the grille from the fan as a support for the CD, ehm, I mean, tail vane.

Did I mention yet that sometimes your creativity scares me?  

(I could point you to a picture of my anemometer now, but it's just plain boring compared to yours: http://www.anotherpower.com/gallery/dinges/anemometer_resized  )

[willib]

Peter, Your kind words made my day for sure...

thanks

i had it apart yesterday to beef up the fan to mount connection so i snapped a pic of the bearings

[alancorey]

You realize of course that this is only an anemometer for HAWTs.  For VAWTs you still need the other kind.  Just kidding.

How's it going with the PIC chips and MPPT?  Haven't seen anything in a while.  I bought some PIC12F683 chips and my Inchworm2 clone kit (from dipmicro) just came in yesterday's mail.  Pretty soon I'll be looking for code to steal, but I still need to order some more odds and ends like connectors and power FETs.

  Alan

[willib]

cool , i can help ya with the assembly(if ya got the unassembled kit).?

i assembled it in one night , and it took about two weeks on and off to get it to work...(insert blushing smiley)

mine came with an unprogrammed chip , luckily i ordered two..

and i was able to duplicate (program) two other chips , with the software needed to program other (target)chips..

one thing if ya got the unassembled kit , do not solder the crystal too close to the circuit board , leave enough of the leads between the circuit board and the crystal to raise it about the height of the f877A