My weekend fun... a Sav!

[wind4Reg2]

I decided I'd put together a Savonius for fun. I have always been curious about them and figured what the heck, it would be a fun weekend project.
The turbine is almost complete, still need to add bearings top and bottom and some sort of PTO. It will still spin in light breezes right now, but really needs bearings. I am not sure what I'll use it for yet, water pumping or air compression or hook up a genny. I'll have to see how it performs to see if it is tower worthy.
I was wondering if anyone has come across low rpm centrifugal clutches, for example, it engages at 30 - 60 rpm?

Here is a pic of it so far:

[Bruce S]

Nice looking dog too .
I'd say put some locking type wheels on it and use what you have there as a pretty nice tower already.

Cheers
Bruce S

[taylorp035]

I was wondering if anyone has come across low rpm centrifugal clutches, for example, it engages at 30 - 60 rpm?

It would be difficult to make one, because acceleration is velocity^2/radius.

Looks like you have about 4 m^2 of area there, so at 20-25%, you could get some reasonable power.

[DamonHD]

You have explained to the dog that it can't stay there?

Rgds

Damon

[Bruce S]

You have explained to the dog that it can't stay there?

Rgds

Damon

I say the dog stay and let it become dog assisted power

[Perry S]

Nice Fidonius turbine.

Perry

[Bruce S]

Nice Fidonius turbine.

Perry

Would that be a... FAWT 

Wind4Reg; Forgive but it's just way too nice outside to be inside an office. I needed the distraction.

It is a nice VAWT, with the amount of torque available to it, even tho it will be a low speed device, it should be easy add a large pulley to the bottom then use a smaller pulley for higher RPM at the gen.
Cheers
Bruce S
 

[SparWeb]

I've tried clutch bearings, for various things, which you might want to consider.

http://www.timken.com/en-us/products/bearings/productlist/roller/needle/Pages/DrawnCupRoller.aspx

[wind4Reg2]

I've tried clutch bearings, for various things, which you might want to consider.
http://www.timken.com/en-us/products/bearings/productlist/roller/needle/Pages/DrawnCupRoller.aspx

I took a look at these bearings, from what I read it looks like they spin freely in one direction, and they engage in the opposite direction, so it doesn't look like these will work for this application, it was worth a shot though.

Nice Fidonius turbine.
Perry

Good one!  That dog has way too much energy, too bad I couldn't harness it.

[tecker]

I takes  a four tier to get a good power factor . That design seems to attain 150 plus rpm in 10 to 20 Mph winds the torque is good so put the cut in around 100 rpm with two more tiers and mid bearing as well as top and bottom.  Boost controller or pulse the rpm range below 100.

[Ungrounded Lightning Rod]

I takes  a four tier to get a good power factor . That design seems to attain 150 plus rpm in 10 to 20 Mph winds the torque is good so put the cut in around 100 rpm with two more tiers and mid bearing as well as top and bottom.  Boost controller or pulse the rpm range below 100.

Rule of thumb for a Sav:  TSR is 0.8 under load for best efficiency.

[wind4Reg2]

I decided that perhaps I put a pulley in this Sav to see what it will do. I built a 22" pulley and attached it to the bottom. Now I have to find a rather large v-belt for this pulley.
Here is a 3.9 MB video of the progress so far: http://users.xplornet.com/~rmanzer/windmill/video/WindMill.m4v

[Norm]

  Why not just put a cam (a simple off center wood disk)
on the bottom and drive a spring powered air compressor
the old fuel pumps worked this way...the spring loaded
diaphram pump only allowed it to reach a certain
pressure......

[electrondady1]

birds will be save from any harm with your design.
but the toad population might be cut drastically
you could lift it up a bit.

[Junkie]

You should see some decent power out of that. What are the blades made from ?