18' Wincharger hybrid update

[Dave B]

My friend and welding wizard Dave Moller and I finally had a chance to lower my tower yesterday. A late November storm tested the limits of my 18' and found the RPM running too high before completely furling. It's not often we get sustained winds over 50 MPH so I let it run and unbelievably had a blade strike the tower.

  Dave is going to lessen the angle of the tail pivot and he is carving me another set of 18' Wincharger profile blades also. We are going to reverse the pitch to run these counter clockwise looking at the front (experimenting with the precession idea, offset is to the right looking at the front) While it is down I will be giving everything a good checking out and photos are soon to follow.

  Dave M's father took these photos last Summer when we raised the new machine. Dave is well out of the crash zone and I'm manning the winch so I was never able to see these views. That's 85' of Rohn 55 tower with serious hardware and fabrication by Dave. Updates to follow.  Dave B.

[Old F]

HEY EVERY ONE TAKE A GOOD LONG LOOK

This is how to do a tower right .  A good rigid tower to start  with all the proper guy wires.

All the Ts crossed and Is doted  Great pixs thanks for sharing

Old F

[Dave B]

Thank you Old F. Safety first. More photos to follow as our modifications on the mill continue. Dave B.

[BruceDownunder]

Yeah,,great photo's of "doing it right"

Those guys,,, we used to rig lattice towers that way for microwave dishes(small)

The reason for the "V" guys is for Torsional(turning) stablization,,sort of the guy tensioned on 2 faces of the tower ,,not just one leg.

The gin pole --is that a rigid piece of pipe at the bottom ? this would stop the gin pole from bending inwards ?.

Post a pic of your lifting tackle,,that would help a lot of people rigging these towers.

Bruce

[Dave B]

I took advantage of 60 plus degree weather here today, it's crazy. I decided to completely disassemble the alternator to give it a good looking at back inside. The blade hub assembly was all glued and screwed together so I cut off the blades at the root and could now have 3 6' blades for a new rotor if I trimmed the 2 to the size of the one that hit the tower. I might be talked into selling these along with my previous completed 12' 3 blade rotor that I hand carved with twist and taper. That one was measured up to 800 RPM with no damage, another overspeed situation caused that time by too little offset. My friend Dave Moller is carving me another 18' Wincharger profile 3 blade set, the performance of this profile blade is tremendous. Almost too good as we are making tail adjustments to be certain to limit the RPM to well under 200 with earlier furling this time and to keep things safe around 3 KW max. Photos to follow and both sets of blades may end up on the classifieds, anyone interested before then let me know. Dave B.