Wisdom :
Please chill dude, this is the BEST forum on the net, trust me...I've been on many other forums and asked simple questions, been told they were dumb, stupid...go get an education,etc lol. These guys know there $#|+ man, and they're kind enough to take the time to answer all of our newbie questions. Especially those out of the box ones. I suggest you read the Otherpower website....every project,etc you'll see they started out the same place as you and I. They're speaking from experience. Anyways that being said;
For your pole idea it depends on where you get your pole, and what type of pole. Don't forget the environmental regulations and the permit process. I have never raised a wind turbine, but i have had 3 poles put into the ground for me. An untreated pole runs around 600.00, treated and certified runs about 900.00 ( Here in Canada ), the cheapest i ever paid was 2500.00 for the pole, having the hole drilled and having the pole put in the ground. None of these used concrete,etc....they just drilled the hole and dropped it in. The Depth varied on all 3 as well, the shallowest being 5 feet, the deepest being 12ft. The most expensive cost me just over 10 000. 90% of these are the labor, the pole costs were the same. You may be able to drill 8ft down for your hole, but how do you plan to get the pole in the ground? They used a very large crane truck to do it for me. ( I'm all for DIY, but some things are just to damn dangerous to do by myself.... )
You also have to look at the economics of this, how many times are you going to have to replace that pole in it's life, now where i live in canada they replace most poles every 10yrs or so....BUT we have extreme cold in the winter ( -20 to - 30 ) and extreme heat in the summer ( up to about 45 ), I'm not sure on the conversion if your in the states, back this up with high winds ( 60 - 100 Km/hr gusts are not uncommon here ). It wreaks havoc on these poles, many of them are almost always leaning,etc and split up the middle. So if you had to have a crane truck in to do this ( which i really think you would / should have ) you're looking around 450/hr ( my local prices ) to do it....plus the cost of the new pole. If you get your pole for free, you have ask yourself WHY? If they were good, the power company would be using them...not tossing them away. Also transportation is a huge issue, you need to look into your local laws, here the longest you can transport without a permit is 40 ft. Anything bigger requires a permit and 2 wide load vehicles ( regardless of width ). Any poles i had brought in were brought in on the crane truck. The guys with the steel pole / towers replace them what...every 50 - 100 years? ideally of course, so if you figure 10 yrs service life out of a telephone pole, you will be replacing it 5 to 10 times in the same time time frame as the ones with the steel pole / tower have done once.
That being said, I have thought the same idea as you before; If I were going to use a telephone pole i would either build the turbine housing to slip around the telephone pole so that it would slip up and down, this being the safest way i could think of, the problem would be that the housing would be massive and weigh several hundred pounds, not incl the internal workings of the generator. Like the others said, this would put massive stress on the pole, this would reduce the poles lifespan even greater. But i would use a cable system, along with some sort of an actuated locking system to lock it in place when at the desired height, so that i could raise and lower it like a flag. Biggest problem is the poles are tapered.
The other way I considered was building lifted platform out of 4 - 6 poles ( i had thought to use the base as a shop, a middle platform as an office,etc and the top to mount a turbine ) I don't like the idea of tilting towers, i prefer fixed things, this is just a personal thing, i don't like the idea of having to tilt it down every 3 or 4 months or ever for that matter, again its just a personal thing. Anyways the tower idea was to use the roof as a platform for oiling,etc or if it did have to tilt,etc i had thought of tilting at the roof line for ease. The problem with both idea's is the poles, they just wont last long enough, they're convenient for the time being but in the long run they run a huge amount of wasted time and wasted money, in my opinion anyways.
Another thing to think about, yous aid your....58? or 68? i don't remember, you're not going to have that many years left of climbing that pole to oil it,etc....so in your situation i tilting pole would make more sense in my opinion anyways. You have to ask yourself....when your 70 / 80 are you going to be comfortable sending one of your kids or your grand kids up there to oil that turbine? Answer that honestly to yourself and you'll find your answer to whether or a telephone pole tower is suited for your application or not . ( I'm 28 and have 5 kids, my answer would be no in my situation ).
Something to point out, I've been toying with the idea of a self lubricating turbine ( note here i have never build a windmill nor the power generating components, but i do have the tools, ability, etc to build this.... ). This might alleviate the problem of climbing that pole when your into your 80's, i would run oil lines down the pole and utilize the heat for a heating application as well... keep your eyes open in the forum, I'm sure i'll be asking a ton of questions there about these things....
Don't get me wrong, I am all for thinking out of the box.....the tower building idea led me to 'I wanna build a castle' lol.... my g/f thought that was nuts lol, I plan to start construction the end of this summer ( moving clear across Canada to, about 5300 km from here so i can do it ).
Clarence
