Author Topic: Hugh's 12' up at 54' (Read 4621 times)

jmk · « **on:** July 01, 2006, 05:38:20 PM »

I have been working on this machine for over a year. Now its up! This is my first project, and it was quite rewarding. I want to say thankyou to Hugh Piggott, Otherpower, And all the great people who helped answer all my questions. There is nothing like the joy of seeing it work so quietly,and smooth. It's a proud felling. I only ran it for a couple of seconds, a couple of times. The first time I thought there was no wind, but it started up real slow. The secound time I couldn't believe how fast it started. I had to short it out real quick because I don't have the ground wires hooked up yet to the batteries. It was only in a slight breeze! I can't weight to get the controls hooked up so I can let her rip. I still have to figure out the dump load. I have an sw2440 Xantrex inverter That I plan to grid tie once I get it all figured out, and ready for permit. Thankyou all! I am a happy man.

jmk · « **Reply #1 on:** July 01, 2006, 11:42:23 AM »

jmk · « **Reply #2 on:** July 01, 2006, 11:55:47 AM »

TomW · « **Reply #3 on:** July 01, 2006, 11:59:57 AM »

JMK;

Hey, there is some guy hanging out on your sawhorses. I suggest you put him to work before he gets away!

Nice looking unit.

Cheers.

TomW

jmk · « **Reply #4 on:** July 01, 2006, 03:54:22 PM »

When I was wiring it up, standing on the saw horses, I had tw o baby fawns run up to me. I was surprised that the mother who was about twenty feet away didn't scold them. I also thought it was neat to see a red fox trot by.

We have been getting to what I would gess to be 20 mpr winds today. I have the machine shorted out because I have to run the ground wires yet. But I am a little surprised to see that the blades will turn in the stronger gust to about 5 rpm. I thought it would be up there dancing all over the place, but it seems to stay within 90 deg of yaw movment. Should the blades be spinning at all when shorted out? I might have set the gap to big. I have about a 3/4" air gap. After reading the past few poast I was scared the rotors were going to hit the stater and cause some magnets to go flying. It really wants to spin. I can't wait to let it loose!

tecker · « **Reply #5 on:** July 01, 2006, 05:06:44 PM »

Very important step for you does the scoraigwind machine fit your needs as far as start up and furl.

I know that deer can still get you even if you are on the sawhorses.

DanG · « **Reply #6 on:** July 01, 2006, 05:10:11 PM »

Has to spin up enough flux to cinch rpms back down, zero rpm equals zero brake action.

Just for demonstration purposes <cough> throw a 300 or 500 watt halogen work lamp into circuit for your mill to chew on though don't walk too far away and be ready to resume shutdown short... but it may reduce your waiting blues.

Shame you can't cruise that hot rod down past the Main Street DQ on a summers saturday night!

Very nice.

~

jmk · « **Reply #7 on:** July 01, 2006, 05:49:54 PM »

Oh man! Start up is excellent. As far as its furling capability I haven't been able to let it spin up to that speed yet. I have the brake switch on.

richhagen · « **Reply #8 on:** July 01, 2006, 11:01:44 PM »

It looks great! I agree with Tom, you should get that guy on the saw horses to help you out a little bit more. It will probably be difficult, but try not to let that guy spend too many hours just watching your beautiful turbine spin in the breeze. I hope the 'permitting' goes well for you and that other guy. Rich

hvirtane · « **Reply #9 on:** July 02, 2006, 02:52:39 AM »

It looks really good.

Are the blades made of solid wood

or of laminated wood?

- Hannu

jmk · « **Reply #10 on:** July 02, 2006, 08:04:47 AM »

I made the blades from rough sawed spruce 1 by 6 boards that we use at work for corner boards on the houses we build. I just ran them through the planer and then cut out the best parts of the boards. Yes, they are laminated.

Blades are acualy easyer to make than they look. If you just follow the step by step procedures they come out looking like blades. It is scary at first because it is a bit confusing. I made one first, then did three at the same time one step at a time. I used an electric hand plainer, and a body grinder with #36 grit sandpaper.

jmk · « **Reply #11 on:** July 02, 2006, 08:17:53 AM »

Yes, I need to really give that guy a kick start. Here is the one who just likes to watch.

Warrior · « **Reply #12 on:** July 02, 2006, 12:12:40 PM »

Excellent Work!!!

Hope you can get it running soon. How did you make the nose cone?

Warrior

kenputer · « **Reply #13 on:** July 02, 2006, 03:01:26 PM »

looks real nice,what's that behind her :-)

jmk · « **Reply #14 on:** July 02, 2006, 04:03:16 PM »

I made the nosecone from sturdy-r fiberglass insulation, by sheets used by the scrap from the people I build houses for. I build about 20 houses a year. No I am not the money maker. I am just the guy who is in the middle! The simple sulotion to me was to make a protracter from the cilling of my garage. Put your blades on a table {saw table}, and spin the foam on the center! Add them up to a nosecone.

jmk · « **Reply #15 on:** July 04, 2006, 08:49:41 AM »

I've been hooking up grounding wires to the guys and cleaning up the yard. I mowed the grass where the tower was,It was getting knee high in some places. It's been a buisy week. I am going to get started on the power lines to the house. I was going to put it in my shed, but decided to put it in the garage. I have a ten foot cable to hook the batteries to the inverter. Xantrex states that the inverter shouldn't be directly above the batteries. Should I place it off to the side or is it better to put it under the bank? off to the side will eat up more room, but I will do it if it's better than below.

It survived the first gusty electric storm this morning. We had probly had 50 mph gust and lightning striks all over. I couldn't keep my eyes of the mill! I didn't see any strikes hit it. The blades with the brake on probly got to 10 rpm. The brake is getting me nurvous! Everything seems to still look fine. The lightning is even scaryer. I'm afraid a bolt might ruin the brake system. I think it would have been smart to have added an alterate brake.

jmk · « **Reply #16 on:** July 04, 2006, 09:31:21 AM »

I wired a plug up to hook to a 12 volt headlight. i pluged it into the mill and it was acting like the brake. I unpluged it and let the mill spin up a little then pluged it back in. It lite up and stalled the mill. I tried again letting the mill speed up more and the bulb bernt out. Oh well,it was a fun experiment.

TomW · « **Reply #17 on:** July 04, 2006, 10:01:27 AM »

JMK;

Xantrex states that the inverter shouldn't be directly above the batteries.

I may be totally wrong here but I think the point there is more that the inverter is isolated from battery outgassing than anything else. I keep my batteries isolated in a vented box and would never include electronics in the box itself but would have no problem installing it above the box in the same room.

Just my thoughts.

Cheers.

TomW

jmk · « **Reply #18 on:** July 04, 2006, 12:55:26 PM »

My manual states to not put it above because the gasses rise and will very quickly curoade the electronics. Maybe they changed there thinking on it?

TomW · « **Reply #19 on:** July 04, 2006, 01:53:41 PM »

JMK;

My battery box isolates the batteries from the rest of the room except a vent tube with a fan that blows air out to the exterior anytime there is a charge coming in. I think my setup would be plenty safe from gas and corrosion from the batteries. If my batteries were in the open I would not have my inverter any closer than necessary.

Fact is I would not run with non enclosed batteries anyway due to explosion hazard and the corrosive effect of the gas.

Many do so with no problems but I am pretty cautious these days.

When in doubt, follow the manufacturers instructions of course, unless they are illegible from being translated from Chinese to French and then to English or something ;=]

Cheers.

TomW

jmk · « **Reply #20 on:** July 04, 2006, 02:39:01 PM »

Maybe I will make a box to hold the batteries like you are saying. I can put them next to the exterior wall with a vent leading to the outside. Maybe I could put them outside in an insulated box with a slide door to govern the air flow. This way in the winter I can just crack the vent open to help keep the batteries warm, and in the summer leave the vent wide open. I bought some UL-16 Interstate batteries. They didn't have any maintenance instructions to go with them. I was wondering if the caps are suposed to be lose on top to vent, or will they vent with them closed?

TomW · « **Reply #21 on:** July 04, 2006, 02:58:17 PM »

JMK;

My battery box is in an outside corner and i just put a 2" PVC tube out thru the side with an elbo on the outside and some fiberglass screen to keep our plentiful bugs out it uses a PC fan glued to the inside end of the tube to blow air out. Very simple plywood box attached to the walls in the corner as 2 of the walls to the box with a lid that comes off with a couple screws and the outside walls of the building are well insulated. the loose fit to the floor provides enough incoming air so the fan doesnt work too hard and has a negative pressure in the box. It draws inside air in so it stays roughly the same temp as the room it is in. We see -20F here occasionally so outside batteries seemed not to be a good idea.

I highly recommend an enclosed battery box so the batteries can be easily vented and there are no worries about objects being dropped on the batteries or anything shorting the terminals. I made mine large enough for 24 T-105 even tho I only have 12 so I can add on if necessary later without rebuilding it.

With a solid lid you don't lose the area for use as you can set things on it without concern for the batteries.

Just how I do it.

Cheers.

TomW

jmk · « **Reply #22 on:** July 04, 2006, 03:39:52 PM »

Yes, I like that idea. How did you wire the fan to come on when the batteries are being charged?

TomW · « **Reply #23 on:** July 04, 2006, 05:11:30 PM »

JMK;

Yes, I like that idea. How did you wire the fan to come on when the batteries are being charged?

Well, for me it was easy. My sources are all DC now [solar panels diode isolated and a rectified at the tower mill] and I use an isolation diode at my batteries and the fan is on the source side of that. So any time there is any power coming in that fan runs. Pretty crude but effective in this situation. I actually run a 24 volt bank and use a 12 volt fan which uses a dropping resistor to limit the voltage the fan sees. There is some waste in the resistor but it is very low and insignificant. If I had to do it over I would simply use 2 12 volt fans in series for more flow but this works pretty well. All the parts are from my scrap pile but I think you can find these muffin fans in several voltages. You might even get away with running a 12 volter on 24 volts for a long time with no trouble but I never tried it myself.

Cheers.

TomW

jmk · « **Reply #24 on:** July 04, 2006, 07:00:47 PM »

Thanks TomW, I apreciate the time you spent in comenting to my questions. I Think its what I am going to do. Now to start diging a 150' ditch. I think I will make a sharp 90 deg about twenty feet from the house and put a ground rod in there too. I'm hoping it will help take a lightning strike to the ground instead of to my battery bank. I wonder if I could run three ac breakers before I rectify it. Then run one big dc breaker before the battery bank? Plus one after the battery bank before the inverter. Would this be over kill?

TomW · « **Reply #25 on:** July 04, 2006, 07:59:55 PM »

JMK;

Glad to help. Not much building at the TomW compound these days but the grey matter still fires a few synapses occasionally ;=].

I used a mini trencher thing to lay my 300 feet of cable and another 500 feet of conduit [a rental trencher].

The thing I did a few years ago was use my rototiller with just the inner 2 tines to bust up the dirt then followed with a shovel to clean out the dirt. Much easier / faster than straight shovel work.

Just an idea I have used in the past.

Conduit makes upgrades easier so I buried both armored cable and 2" PVC to my big tower plus some conduit to the house for various things like data cable phone lines and a run of #10 -3 Romex to use inverter power in the house

Cheers.

TomW

jmk · « **Reply #26 on:** July 05, 2006, 12:04:34 AM »

I have a 300' roll of 1" spinkler tubing. I was thinking of useing as conduit. I was thinking of mounting a sky cam on the back side of the mill. This way when the machine yaws you get a diferant veiw. That's just an idea though. I am planing on running three # 6 wires for the three phase. Maybe I will add a couple 10 gage too. The trencher sounds like a great Idea. I wonder how well it would work on hills? I have to go down a hill and up a steep hill full of trees. This isn't going to be fun. The rototiller would work, but i would have to rent it too.

I was reading some of your files. The dumpload file was intresting. Did you end up useing two C-60 controlers, and if so how are they working for you? I have a C-40 and I should have bought a C-60. I wonder if I could hook a C-60 in with it? Maybe anouther C-40 would go better? I seen a Gaums Isle post where Dan B ran a 12 volt version of my alternator at 2 killawatts for an hour bolted to the truck wheel. Hugh calls it a 1,000 watt turbine. I not sure what it will be doing at furl or in a strong gust yet. I wired mine at 24 volt so the amps will be half. It will probaly do a little over 40 amps.

News:

Author Topic: Hugh's 12' up at 54' (Read 4621 times)