I heard the cable go SNAP...

[SparWeb]

Self-explanatory photo:

The tower, blades, generator, all are broken.  Even the cable inside the tower was damaged.  I'm in a foul mood right now, obviously, but I can muster the nerve to admit to the mistake, and if I wait to post the picture, I never will.

Don't know if I've made myself clear in the past that working with towers can be dangerous.  But of course, it can happen to anyone.  I still don't believe it.

Trust nothing you build unless you test it.  Even then...

I was using the tow hook on the bumper of my truck to lower the tower.  I've pulled other trucks with these hooks!!!!  The tow cable, and the hook show NO SIGN OF DAMAGE!  I am at a loss to explain what happened, beyond some speculation about the cable resting on the point of the hook when I loaded it up, not in the throat...  or that the hook could bend in some strange way, but spring back 100% straight!  Nothing completely plausible.  All 3 of the shackles on the tow cable are in place and solid.  The two bumper hooks are straight and line up with each other perfectly.

And yet...

Yes I'll build another.

But no more of this raising and lowering with trucks and tractors.  I need a winch.

[pepa]

my heart goes out to you SparWeb, but the next mill will be even better. pepa

[BruceDownunder]

Oh Sparweb, you poor bugger, sorry . I know exactly how you feel ,,,my dog wouldn't come home for 3 days....

Mate, you probably had the wire rope spring up over the hook part of the hook ,and away she goes... next time "mouse" the hook and thimble/loop in the wire rope with soft wire to prevent it springing up ...

If that was the case !!!.

an old trick some "bushies" told me once when winching with wire rope ---throw a sleeping bag or old hessian bags over the winching wire --it breaks the dangerous whiplash if something goes wrong..

Anyhow mate , nice to see you got it out of your system and told us ,,we are all better for that ..

So, back to fixing her up ,mate,

Bruce

[oztules]

I am at a loss to work out how the rotor is so far from center in the picture. I had assumed the clearance was small and that even with the end shield smashed, the rotor would still be close to center.... How?

Just an observation......

The one thing that I thought motor conversions offered over flimsy looking axials, was their robust engineering..... however, every smash involving an axial, seemed to only cause blade damage (that I can recall), and the alternators all got off  damage free....

So if the motor rebuilds don't offer even this advantage over the axial, it is hard to see what advantage they do offer..... given the iron drag, reactance current limiting, and generally higher resistance windings/higher blade speeds....getting hard to find an excuse to build them at all.

Sad to see the loss of so much work in such a short time.

My condolences.

.............oztules

[TomW]

Damn, that sucks hard! Always a tough nut to swallow when your hard work goes pooph in a second or two.

Thanks for sharing.

The post mortem forensics can be tough to sort out when nothing obvious is the cause.

Good luck getting it repaired / replaced.

I just picked up this winch for my 47 foot mast that I hope to get DanB to install a 10 footer from OtherPower on this spring / summer:

Its WWII vintage off a repair ship.rated at 1000# but I think it could lift a LOT more. My 2,000# rated HF worm drives weigh less than the handle on this one and feel much less safe.

I used a pickup or ATV a couple times to raise my 30 footer and it just felt too "coarse" for the job. Winching is a bit more effort but offers much more control.

Again, good luck with it. You can borrow the winch if you want but I suspect you are too far away to make that work.

Tom

[SparWeb]

Thanks for your thoughts.  I'm still puzzled even after sleeping on it.  There indeed could have been a whiplash, but there is a finger over the mouth of the truck's hook...

But it could have been that, in spite of my disbelief.

[SparWeb]

The rotor has been thrust 3 or 4 inches backward by the impact.  The blades were face-down on impact and the hub made a circular imprint in the earth.  Very little energy was absorbed by the blades, except the roots, one of which was crushed.  The impact was taken mostly by the shaft thrust into the rear bearing, and the back shell (an iron casting) shattered.  The hub crashing into the front shell cracked it, too.  The rotor is entirely out of the stator, so now it is free to shift to one side.

I will continue to use motor conversions because they do not melt.  That old GE motor was made in 1960 or so.  It was a rusty old motor housing.

For the past month I've been deep in the math of matching my Toshiba motor conversion to blades, and the curves certainly won't play nicely together.  Just when you want the generator to load down the prop and seek a lower TSR, the motor conversion unloads the prop and it speeds up!  Reliable furling is critical.

[TomW]

Uh, lest I be misunderstood that "30 footer" is the height of the 4 leg water pumper tower my 8 foot rotor turbine sits on. Wish I had a 30 foot turbine some days, though.

Just so folks don't get confused.

Tom

[ghurd]

Ouch.

Sorry to see it like that.

G-

[FishbonzWV]

Well Steven that went from an oops to an uh oh real quick.

Sorry to see you lose it.

How would you like to test drive my 3/4 hp conversion?

It could be a fill in until you sort out your Toshie.

I don't have a good wind site and I'm just dying to see it fly in real wind.

If you do want it (pro bono) send me an email (it's in my user file).

Bonz

[SparWeb]

That's a kind offer, but the tower is broken, too.  The gin-pole mount was bent by the recoil of it flinging upward...  then abruptly being stopped.  The power cable is stripped in a couple of places, too, so I'm faced with replacing just about everything!

If I'm going to build a new tower, it might as well be big enough for Toshi, and then some.  12-13 feet of windmill mandates a more sturdy tower.  I may go with a truss.

Dan Lennox sure knew when to post his classified!!!!!

[Jason Wilkinson]

Sorry from so far to hear of your loss, i know how it feels, had it done to me (3) three times, and 3 times determined to go again . You were a help to me before , keep it up

Jason

[richhagen]

Ouch Stephen, sorry for the loss, can't think of anything to add to what happened though, if nothing is damaged, it seems it must have come off of the hook somehow.  Rich

[Shadow]

Sorry for the loss, I know what your going through! I think youre in Alta if I remember correct? Theres gotta be lots of old wind charger towers out there,I have two set up in my yard that both pivot to lay down. I have a tractor tire standing upright in case the cable breaks, to cushion the fall. And it happened! About 1/2 way down when it had the most weight on the cable the hook pulled off the front end loader! Down it came landing on the tractor tire, the tower got bent bad but the wind turbine never touched the ground!I have numerous other towers for parts, so changed some angle iron and back using that same tower. Except now I use a winch, you have way more control.

    I just bought this tower at an auction sale on Friday, Its an original Jacobs 50 foot with a huge footprint!I got the Jacobs 140 volt generator, with tail, blades everything but the control box. The gen head weighs 440 lbs!Its all original  equipment and mint condition, as it was put into storage years ago. Nobody was interested in it at all, I paid $110.00 for everything!

[SparWeb]

110$ for a whole Jacobs!?!?!  No fair!  That's rubbing salt in my wound!  

They didn't happen to have a second one, did they?

Did that exer-cycle come from the same auction?  You aren't going to join the pedal-generator crowd are you?

Thanks for saying "hi".  Yes I'm in Alberta, close to that city that Sask people must be sick of hearing about.  It's still all brown here, too.

[Janne]

Sad to see so much work goto pieces

"weeks planning, months building, years perfecting and seconds destoying"

Keep up with it.. don't let this mishap disturb you for too long.

[behoof]

Man, I AM sorry to see that... know how you must feel...

as someone already said, "The next one will be even better!"

Best to you and keep up the great work.

behoof

[luv2weld]

I need a serving wench too!!

Oh, wrong kind of winch.

That really hurts!! Gives me that sick feeling in the

stomach. Sorry to see it.

Ralph