will my test load stall my blades?

[strider3700]

I just got my first mill up on a test stand last night and of course the wind was non existant.  This morning It was gusty but it wouldn't spin.

The generator is an ametek 36 V

The blades are PVC cut from 4" green sewer pipe 60" diameter rotor.

At this point it doesn't pivot into the wind I've been turning it manually.  The tail paint was still drying and I don't have part of the mast to allow it to turn.  

the first thing I noticed this morning was that the blades spun kinda when I turned the entire thing around and made it a downwind...  Looking online this morning thats because I put the hub on backwords and the blades are facing the wrong way. I'll fix that when I get home tonight.

Even turned downwind it still didn't want to start spinning much.  I currently have a 12V backup light wired directly off of the generator. It does make the generator conciderably more difficult to start spinning by hand.  I'm wondering could this load be stalling it?   If it is does this mean when I track down some diodes and hook up to a 12V battery that will also stall the unit?

I'm still having tons of fun and learning a lot at this point.

[Flux]

Yes, you need the diode and battery. The battery will not stall it.

Flux

[Spdlmt150]

Hooking a light directly to the gen will create a constant load at any rpm. As soon as it tries to turn, there will be drag from the windings pushing current through the light. If it is run through diodes and into a battery, the gen will be able to spin up until it reaches battery voltage before the windings create drag. Once it is hooked up to a battery, it will spin easily until it reaches battery voltage, and then it's an issue of blade stall if it won't continue to spin up beyond that point.

[strider3700]

Thanks for the help guys.  I'll track down a diode and see if it will keep running.  

[ghurd]

Might try looking for a 25 to 35A bridge rectifier (radio shack).

Send the + from the motor (depending on rotation) to both the ~ terminals,

then the + terminal of the bridge goes to the battery +.

A good wind will kill the commonly available 6A diodes.

G-

[strider3700]

Thanks I was just trying to figure out what I needed for a diode.  I'll see if I can stop in tonight and get this working while the wind is still around.

[nothing to lose]

Until you get it wired up you can also play with it manually.

Take a wire off the light bulb and theres no load, the genny should spin up freely if it will spin up at all, once turning a decent speed connect the wire back to the bulb. Just don't let it really fly fast no load then connect the bulb or you may blow the bulb if too much power? Worst that should happen is you stall the genny if the load is too high or you blow out the bulb if you got too much power at once.

You can take a 12Vdc fan and wire that directly your genny. There should not be enough load to stop the genny from starting and the fan should run faster or slower based on the speed of the genny. I do this alot with smaller stuff. I like a 12Vdc 6" fan made for cars that plugs into the cigarette lighter for this.

Lots of other things you can try if you don't get the parts right away. I know how Rat Shack is around here, I drove 50 miles to one to get Bridges and they had 2 in stock, I wanted 5 that day!

[strider3700]

I want to thank everyone for their help.  It's currently out there spinning away madly with no load connected.  I'm going to go and turn it out of the wind since it seems to start vibrating at high speeds and the blades vanish into a silvery blur of death.  I'd love to connect up to the wire and see what it would be producing power wise but it's pouring rain and the wires are still short and none trivial to access at the moment.

So I'll watch it spin like hell for a few more moments then shut it down for the night until I can move further along in the project.  seeing the Solar panels crank out a few amps was cool but this is so much more satisfying.  The wife even loves it so flying it in the front yard is currently ok.