tilt over tower

[(unknown)]

Living in the midwest I see tons of TV antenna towers made from well casing. 2 legs supporting a 3rd piece of pipe on a pivot. Many have guy wires that go from the top to an x brace just above the 2 legs then attach at the bottom of the center pole. Any thoughts on shortening this design to 30 feet or so? I am looking at the smaller wind generators with 3 or 6 blades that are only 600 watts or so. Living in SW MN only 40 miles from buffalo ridge and the huge wind farms I pretty much have constant wind on most days. I searched the archives and saw something similar made from utility poles but well casing is easier to come by.

[SparWeb]

I live in Alberta, where the oil business is booming, so lots of leftover pipe here, too.  Making a tower out of this material is possible, you could start with Dan B's Tilt-tower design.  That tower would work as-is for your requirement.

What diameter of pipe do you have available?  Why only small windmills?

(Usually after many members build a small one, they have to build the next one bigger!)

[Mary B]

small gets me by the city zoning, large I need a permit. I mainly am going to use ut to supply backup power and run the corn stove. I am also adding 200 watts of solar as soon as it warms up enough to work outside without frostbite :-)

[ghurd]

Mary,

Wholly Molly!  How long and often is your grid down?

The 200W of solar should handle it, no problem.  And some other stuff too, on a daily basis.  Even in the snow belt.

With constant wind, just a simple and tiny conversion (box fan?) should handle keeping the batteries fully charged until the grid goes down.  A 600W windmill for maintaining backup use batteries is an exercise in dumpload controls.

A 50W PV should be able to keep a few hundred AH 12V battery bank charged for back-up use.

Wind is still more fun.

G-

[vawtman]

Hello Mary

 Interested to know the height restrictions for your sight and the surroundings.Maybe a pic of your place by chance.

[Mary B]

no height restriction but the city snuck in a tax on wind power in the form of building permits on wind generators with a blade span exceeding 10 feet. The back corner of my lot is treeless with a clear shot from the nw all the way to the sw where the house sits. from my upper deck that is 12 feet off the ground I can see 10 miles or so. I am lucky and live on the edge of town with field on 2 sides and nothing but a horse pasture across the street. I consider a breeze here as anything under 20mph winds :-)If I can supply more of the house I will but my main concern is heat and a few lights at the moment. The corn stove draws 2 amps and when in use the fans never shut off.

[RP]

Is there any limit on how many 10 foot mills you can have?

:-)

[thefinis]

http://www.fieldlines.com/story/2006/7/26/135141/023

Check this thread out on towers. Probably where you saw the tower made from poles. To know what will work for you will take a good bit more info on what you are wanting to put on it and what size tower and tower materials.

Like how big a diameter turbine

Furling or nonfurling

Height of tower

Size of pipe

Depth on pipe buried in ground

Type of base construction for tower

Basic answer is yes it should work on a >10 ft turbine if built well and guyed right.

Finis