I have never been involved in an Internet discussion before so I find this mildly interesting. I have worked almost daily with my wind turbine design for several years now and have a deeper understanding of the device that is difficult to attain from your vantage point I realize. Nearly all of the problems cited in your discussion were realized and resolved long ago. For example, the hydraulic ram pumps that control the shutters have a center by-pass area that allows the fluid to flow from one side of the piston to the other side without restriction to movement of the piston and the piston only generates resistance by pumping pressurized hydraulic fluid and stops the rotation of the shutters at each end of the cylinder to prevent impact on becoming fully open or fully closed against the stops. The energy harnessed would have been dissipated as an impact to the stops and would not have otherwise benefited the power output of the unit. I have turned this potential negative impact into a positive pumping force that adds output power - hence no noise or impact and greater output power.
The rotatable shutters apply no force against the central disk (the force accelerates the shutter as it rotates on its axis) until the shutters are fully open and reach stops that transfer the winds force and the kinetic energy of motion of the shutter to the disk that is thereby transferred to the output shaft. Further as previously cited, a very minimal force is required to produce movement of the shutters, which creates almost no resistance to the wind because of the balanced mass of the shutter pairs that you can move with your finger tips. The winds force merely accelerates the shutters in either the opening or closing directions depending on the direction of the wind during rotation, without applying any force to the disk that is connected to the output shaft. The kinetic energy gained via the accelerated mass of the shutters is harnessed by the hydraulic pumps. It is relatively simple, works very well, and harnessing the kinetic energy of the accelerated shutters via the hydraulic pumps adds a lot of power to the overall output over and above the direct force of the wind against the shutters when they are fully open catching the wind. This is a process unique to my wind turbine.
Yes the wind turbine operates at very low wind speeds. My test unit is set up directly beside a conventional horizontal axis wind turbine for comparison and the VAWT operates nearly all the time and the HAWT only runs intermittently. Although we know there is simply very little power within low wind speeds. At least you can efficiently harness the power that is there.
Another aspect of the design that it appears most of you are missing is that my vertical axis wind turbine also produces significant positive sideways lift effect that provides a motive force in the direction of its rotation. You may be aware of recent studies that show lift is more an effect of Newton's third law of an equal and opposite reaction instead of Bernoulli's law as older science believed which is evident when you see an airplane flying upside down. The wind deflected downward by the upward angle of the airfoil produces an equal and opposite upward force against the wings that provides a lift effect; otherwise, the airplane would drop like a rock from the Bernoulli effect pushing downward on the wings instead of up as the surfaces of the wings are reversed in upside down flight. In upside down flight, the Bernoulli Effect's downward push must be overcome by the lift provided by the Newtonian effect, thus the angle of attack (in order to attain more Newtonian effect lift) must be increased to overcome the negative Bernoulli effect in order to maintain upside down flight.
In this same manner the shutters open up vertically and are at a slight angle to the wind as they begin rotating into the wind and produce a sideways lift effect pushing the shutter in the direction of rotation. The shutters then rotate more directly into the wind and drag becomes the main force with an almost perfect ninety degree vector angle as the shutter rotates to a ninety degree angle to the direction of the wind. As the shutters continue to rotate beyond the ninety degree vector angle position, the angle of the open shutters into the wind again produces lift as the vector angle narrows again to a sideways lift effect pushing the shutter in the direction of rotation until it closes to repeat the process.
My design and vector angle analysis of the various angles of the shutters during rotation of the vertical axis wind turbine represent a fundamentally new approach to generating wind power. We will soon have validation of the output power via a major university study that will be conducted in Baltimore, Maryland later this year.
The wind turbine will be coupled to a hydro-turbine (rotated in reverse to become a hydro-propeller) on a catamaran that will make the trip from its place of construction on the Mississippi Gulf Coast to Baltimore, Maryland (where we are establishing our manufacturing base) via wind power. When on site the unit will be anchored and the wind turbine and hydro-turbine will be decoupled. Each unit will produce power independently (the hydro-turbine will produce power from tidal movement) and the wind turbine will generate wind power for demonstration of the Power Catamaran in the Baltimore Harbor. The resulting output power of both the wind turbine and hydro-turbine will be certified be independent third parties from a major university. I know the output power of the VAWT but am under agreement not to release our test data until independently verified.
Bob Hunt
Inventor
