Author Topic: Poster qualifications  (Read 374 times)

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esc

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Poster qualifications
« on: December 05, 2008, 01:39:44 PM »
On some other boars I frequent there are rating systems by which you can judge a users qualifications.  Post counts, post quality ratings and e-bay like trader scores are just a few.


It sure would be nice if there were something similar here.  So that when someone posts about a 300% improvement in their mills output I would have an idea as to whether I should follow my skeptical nature about such things, or actually take the time to investigate further.


I don't know if scoop is capable of such a thing, but it seems like it might be since there is a mechanism by which posts can be rated.


I found where you can look at ratings GIVEN by a user, but not those RECEIVED by a user.  Did I just miss it some where?

« Last Edit: December 05, 2008, 01:39:44 PM by (unknown) »

wooferhound

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #1 on: December 05, 2008, 02:03:01 PM »
I usually check the User Info to see more about someones qualifications

On the Main Pages & on Posted Stories, you can click on the Username of the poster to get that info.

In comments you can click on the "(User Info)" link to see the information.


The information available is . . .

· View comments posted by UserName

· View UserName's diary

· View stories posted by UserName

· View comment ratings by UserName

· View UserName's files

« Last Edit: December 05, 2008, 02:03:01 PM by wooferhound »

esc

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #2 on: December 05, 2008, 02:29:56 PM »
Yes, and that is all useful information.

But something that does not take a lot of research would be useful.  For instance, just a posting count, very common on most boards, would tell me at a glance if someone was a "newbie" (like me) or a long timer (like you).


BTW, I have not seen any posts that were "Rated".  Is that feature used here at all?

« Last Edit: December 05, 2008, 02:29:56 PM by esc »

TomW

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #3 on: December 05, 2008, 04:08:57 PM »
A high post count could simply mean "post whore" no relationship to quality just frequency of posting.


Some of the sharpest folks seldom post but when they do it is quality info. Others post constantly and the information is bull.


Just a thought.


Tom

« Last Edit: December 05, 2008, 04:08:57 PM by TomW »

ghurd

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #4 on: December 05, 2008, 05:37:23 PM »
What if today was the first day Flux or Zubbly or...  came upon this site?

Then posted some crazy ideas about accurate coil turn counts, or how to make a wonderful motor conversion?


I completely stopped reading a forum or 3 because people put so much value on "stars" instead of quality.  Someone with simply horrid advice is believed because thay have more "stars".

I expect I would have a decent rating one one scale or another, but I still have some pretty simple questions and more than my share of hair-brained ideas.


People with a far lower rating than myself would be Amanda, Dean, 100 others, but when the right person talks about the right topic, I listen very closely.


fieldlines tends to not care about anything except decent reasonable advice.

When someone posts a bad idea, users tend not to sugar-coat the responses.

I LIKE it that way because I wasted a lot of time, effort and money chasing bad ideas perpetuated by posters with "lots of stars".


Case in Point.  I have a ~7 pound device (3" dia x7" long?) that makes 12VDC at 121RPM.  

Some forum's members call these kind of numbers the holy grail of PVC windmills.

I will tell you it won't make 5W into a 12V battery.


And now I just PO'd a whole bunch of readers from another forum.

I hope they don't sign up here so they can give me a bad rating!

See what I mean?

G-

« Last Edit: December 05, 2008, 05:37:23 PM by ghurd »
www.ghurd.info<<<-----Information on my Controller

TomW

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #5 on: December 05, 2008, 06:18:14 PM »


BINGO!


« Last Edit: December 05, 2008, 06:18:14 PM by TomW »

electronbaby

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #6 on: December 05, 2008, 07:19:42 PM »
I like your Bio by the way. :-)
« Last Edit: December 05, 2008, 07:19:42 PM by electronbaby »
Have Fun!!!  RoyR KB2UHF

David HK

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #7 on: December 06, 2008, 01:05:36 AM »
This forum runs very smoothly.


Most people get to know each others level of competence by coming here and reading postings quietly for a long time.


You seem to want to introduce another level of bureaucracy that will not, in my view, make one iota of difference to the quality and tolerance that we all enjoy at the moment.


Are we here because of you, or, are you here because of us?


David HK

« Last Edit: December 06, 2008, 01:05:36 AM by David HK »

oztules

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #8 on: December 06, 2008, 04:02:21 AM »
No qualifications are necessary to post here. You make your case and it will be tested.

Even pathological liars tell the truth sometimes.


I have made a large number of posts, some good, some bad, some right and some wrong.


It is for the individual to determine the usefulness of each post independently of any previous posts... ratings are for tv stations... where it's all nonsense anyway.


It is simple to get 300% improvement on a lousy system, or a poorly matched alternator to battery bank. Conversely it is very difficult to improve on a well matched system.


The post you refer too is for a poorly matched long pole ferrite magnet iron cored alternator, poorly matched to a battery bank. It is difficult to make a change to these alternators that doesn't improve them. They top out at under 300 watts into a 24v battery bank. Just changing the bank to 48v would improve it considerably.


What is pointed out, is that with judicious use of capacitors, this system has had an astounding improvement, and along the way, seems to be a better match to the wind than using just sophisticated solid state technology... which improved it considerably as well. Further, it was found that you can drive different battery/grid inverter requirements from the same mill concurrently using caps as system isolators (left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing).


Once that was established, it was found that you could improve the lower end as well with a cap doubler... all connected at the same time.... and with no switching.


It is highly unlikely that this kind of improvement is possible with a well matched normal axial flux, but some ideas can be taken from this for the well matched system.... Notably the 3ph doubler.


If an axial is well matched to the wind, it is likely the cut in will be unreasonably high for a low wind area. Here a booster of some kind will be useful. Solid state switchers is one credible way, and for the less electronically inclined, capacitor doublers may fill that gap... better or worse.... I don't know at the moment. I have so much wind here that I rarely don't achieve cut in... and mine is 135rpm for 4m prop with about  6.5 TSR.


I have achieved over 300% increase in it's nominal output by mistake. I upped the battery voltage to 80v, and drove a 4ohm load from it, when the wind was driving 20 or more amps into the battery and load. I released the battery load and ran on the resistive load only. The voltage shot up to 145 odd volts at over 35A...thats over 5kw for a nominally 1kw machine.


It is also easy to get a 300% decrease in output. If I connect to a 24v battery bank, my cut in comes down to 77 rpm. It puts out 1-2amps in nearly any wind, and in a strong wind gets up to 5Amps maybe 6 in a big storm. So my system put out only 120w or so maximum.... but if I change my battery to 48v, I will get 1-1.5kw before furl in the same winds... nearly 1000% just by changing the battery volts.. whooppee... big wow, and if I change the furling point that will go up to over 2kw.


So 300% is no big deal, but if you can do it with no change to the intrinsic load, then you have a very poor performer running a whole lot better.... not a mystery, but from a low base.


It's all about researching the answer. If it is too good to be true, chances are it's not true. But sometimes you miss the thrust of the argument by only reading the headlines, and not understanding the system involved, or misinterpreting what was said.


If this man said he measured XYZ then I have no doubt whatsoever that is what was measured.


You rated this poorly, when I know it deserved so much better..just shows ratings are subjective nonsense.


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

maybe a little off topic, but it was a rant anyway.

« Last Edit: December 06, 2008, 04:02:21 AM by oztules »
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Flux

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #9 on: December 06, 2008, 06:26:20 AM »
I don't normally reply to these sort of things.


There is no real way of knowing if advice is useful or not unless you have a basic idea in the first place. The internet is a wonderful thing and a great asset but you have to be careful , there is enough ignorance in some places to feed a pig, its up to you to weed out the junk. I don't think any rating is useful or desirable.


My main comment is on what Oztules has discussed. The only thing that makes much improvement with a mill is matching the prop to the load. Anything that improves the matching will make a big difference.


In the old days with wound field machines it was extremely difficult to get useful power in low winds and if you tried you ended up with big and costly generators. You were lucky to get anything at 10 mph and you were lucky to be able to load the prop beyond 20 mph without large cost and weight. The result was that the generator was probably running reasonably efficiently in the 15mph region and you matched the prop fairly well.


With the introduction of neo magnets the whole thing changed and it became possible to get something in lower winds. On most sites this is a big step forward and most designs have tended to be optimised for the low wind condition. This makes a lot of sense for small battery charging machines ( I won't comment on others).


You have good performance over the common wind range and in times of storm when the big winds come the batteries are probably charged anyway. This is why the simple schemes seem to work adequately enough and I can understand those who accept the simplicity. The down side is the issue of stator heating if you insist on incorporating the necessary losses in the alternator rather than outside.


Having grown up with machines matched for the higher wind conditions I was never happy to accept the miserable performance of holding these things down to stall with high electrical losses. I will accept that the energy capture is not drastically improved on most sites by improving the output in the region of 20mph and upwards unless you alter your use to make better use of high winds. If you are cooking a dump load most of the time the high wind improvement will pass you by.


Machines such as the F & P whose only virtue seems to be availability and cost probably don't score too well in very low wind and certainly will not load a reasonable sized prop in high winds ( prop runs away). These can probably be drastically improved by various changes.


The axial machines can be improved by winding for a lower voltage as long as you do something to reach cut in in low winds. The alternative is to keep the original winding and let machine volts rise above battery volts in high winds.


I don't think we should discredit any scheme that makes an attempt to match the load, it is just a balance of cost and complexity against the power gained and whether it is worth the effort. The thing that always wins out in the end is a bigger prop but if you are restricted in prop size by other considerations then these schemes have their merit. This looks to be a winner for the F&P it remains to be seen how much benefit it is to other schemes.


Flux

« Last Edit: December 06, 2008, 06:26:20 AM by Flux »

esc

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #10 on: December 06, 2008, 06:39:38 AM »
You make a very good point, and I thank you for taking the time to write such a detailed explanation of the post that got me thinking along these lines.


It was the part of that post which said,


"I do not believe there is any limit to what alternator is used in a windmill, for a benefit to be seen.  The low cutin benefits are additive to the normal output.  "  


which really made me skeptical.


As far as a post count, I personally would not use such a thing as the ONLY way to evaluate a posters credentials.  But when someone with a high post count, posts something that is difficult to believe, at least I can assume that other regulars to this board will be familiar with the original poster and are likely to give that poster the attention they deserve.  I.E. if it is someone who always posts a bunch of garbage, they are likely to get very few responses from other high count posters.


It is a reputation thing.  It is certainly true that people with bad reputations can post good ideas and people with good reputations can post bad ideas.  But when dealing with a field which is relatively new to me, I would prefer to take my advice from those with more experience and a good reputation.  


But how do I know who has these things?  Reading old posts is very helpful (and time consuming).  But I would welcome any additional tools.


In addition, let me assure you that I am not trying, in any way, to force any changes upon this board. It was the current ability to "rate" posts, but no way to see rating given to posters, which got me thinking along these lines.

« Last Edit: December 06, 2008, 06:39:38 AM by esc »

oztules

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #11 on: December 06, 2008, 07:58:15 AM »
Esc,


"I do not believe there is any limit to what alternator is used in a windmill, for a benefit to be seen.  The low cutin benefits are additive to the normal output. "


This appears to be a belief or opinion drawn from observation.


The low cutin benefits are additive (talking about the 3ph doubler), as without a booster, no power is registered until design cutin is achieved. So any watt you can garner by use of a booster of any kind... is in addition to what you would have gotten before (which was nothing below cutin).


This bit is conjecture on my part. I would assume that the impedance presented to the mill once cutin is achieved by this small doubler, will probably not unduly load the mill on top of it's main load. He hasn't noticed that happening, but he also has series caps on the main inputs, no longer is it direct loading, it is a much softer start, which may allow the blades to get up to their operating speed more easily.


However, this may make a difference to a partly stalled  direct input system, (as they tend to build here) I don't know. If they used resistance to get the thing to perform, this may partly negate it.... someone may test it, then we will know.


Enjoy the board.


.........oztules

« Last Edit: December 06, 2008, 07:58:15 AM by oztules »
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jonas302

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #12 on: December 06, 2008, 08:13:07 AM »
Skeptical nature is good as you get used to reading all the posts its easy to see who has the good info

Also everytime somebody makes a claim measurments and proof are imediatly demanded

We have seen liars and hardheaded people that insisted there ideas worked without proof run out of here Tom and Kurt do a pretty good job keeping the board info accurate
« Last Edit: December 06, 2008, 08:13:07 AM by jonas302 »

elt

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #13 on: December 06, 2008, 09:21:20 AM »
> But something that does not take a lot of research would be useful.


Surely you didn't mean that... when you search the board in advance of posting, can't you tell who the doers are and who the parrots are on a subject? If not, I don't think a rating will help.


- Ed.

« Last Edit: December 06, 2008, 09:21:20 AM by elt »

Dave B

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #14 on: December 06, 2008, 12:15:07 PM »
 There are several good talkers on this board who would also make great politicians or weather forecasters. What I mean is they really can't be wrong and are practiced at explaining what they are nearly 100 % certain of but then also put in there the  "how evers" "buts" "possibly" "could also" etc. etc. to nearly every statement they make.


 I am not trying to discredit anyone of their knowledge but just would like to expose a bit of their ability to "sell" without possibly ever having "been there, done that". The old saying that still water runs deep holds true for many here who learn primarily by experiment and report their findings when they know of helpful information.


 It is too bad that there is no simple way to see through the smoke and mirrors without getting your hands dirty to determine your own credibility rating of the posters here.


 Take a good look at how this board got started. Personally I would (and have) put a lot of confidence in those who have been there and done that and written about it besides. Dave B.

« Last Edit: December 06, 2008, 12:15:07 PM by Dave B »
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esc

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Re: Poster qualifications
« Reply #15 on: December 06, 2008, 07:17:54 PM »
Unfortunately, I am not qualified to discuss the hypothesis presented in an authoritative manner.  But anytime some one tells me that they "do not believe there is any limit", about anything, I will be skeptical.


Maybe it is true.  I hope it IS true.  But that discussion probably belongs in the original thread, not here.


Thank you again for your opinion.  I'm looking forward to debating with you again in the future.  :)

« Last Edit: December 06, 2008, 07:17:54 PM by esc »