home made water turbine

[whythehecknot]

Hi there! just started here on the discussion board a few weeks ago and posted a concern I had in the pub section about batteries. Everybody is super nice and I got plenty of help with my problem.  Well before you know it I was promising to show some pictures of a water turbine I had built from scratch, and so here they are. Right now its hooked up and making juice ( about 150 watts ) and doing well. I hand cast all of the aluminum parts myself, and the alternator I built using some leftover stuff from my wind turbine project. The whole thing fits inside a 10 inch water pipe. It charges 24 volt ( although the stator I design to run on 12 volt) and is enough to run the TV and some lights for my father in law, not to mention an occational power tool. My father in law is a very talented man and years ago he built a really big turbine, well big compared to the one I built it was big, and was able to generate about a 1000 watts with it. The plans he got from an old popular mechanics magazine. He had some issues that he wasnt able to resolve though and shut the thing down after three years of constant use. One of the issues being how to control the power ( he used a 120 volt dc generator ). He was having to constantly keep things powered up to load the generator and keep things at the right voltage. When he would turn one thing on he had to turn something else off. And as you can imagine after awhile it became very tedious, He had no idea how to make a charge contoller and I would imagine there might not have been much available to him at that time . So that and the fact the creek in the summer time just didnt have enough water to run such a big turbine led him to abandon the whole thing. And so he ran generators for ear until just recently hooking up this new little turbine. Please let me know if the pics make it through.  http://s1094.photobucket.com/albums/i442/redhairdman/?action=view&current=pigsandwatertubine008.jpg&newest=1
  Im not too good with the computer so I hope the link is good.

[artv]

Hi ..WN,...I'd like to see those plans, sounds interesting...In the one pic ...what are the two big steel plates for??
Do they add centrifigal force??......artv

[whythehecknot]

I dont have any plans per se, however I could put my drawings of the original design that I came up with on photo bucket as well, give me a few days to go over them and make any changes. The two disks I cast from aluminum and they are only for holding the top and bottum bearings, its the magnet rotors that turn in the middle.

[keithturtle]

Thanks for the pics - seems like a very simple solution to suspending the stator.  Do you think it needs more than three tie rods?

Turtle

[wpowokal]

well done, not only have you made it but it is producing usable power, personally I would be interested in your casting of alie parts.

allan

[whythehecknot]

@Keithturturtle, it doesnt look like it but the rods actually make it very rigid. And then plus the whole thing fits into a pipe, making it even more so but really is redundant in that respect
@wpowokal, I think we could work something out, send me a message via my email.
  This weekend Im going up to work on a trail that my father in law can use to ride his quad down to the creek. Presently its farely trecherous for him ( he's 73 and not in all too good of health) and so wont be posting another comment until this coming Monday so please have a good weekend everybody, and well talk with you again Monday. And I will also send more pics as well, some of the site and a few more of the turbine.

[machinemaker]

nice looking work. you might want to buy some petro bond oil based foundry sand, it is great to work with and will give you a smoother surface texture. Do you ever go to alloy avenue.com ? It is a great casting forum.
kent

[whythehecknot]

@machinemaker, Yes and no, well Ive been to the backyardmetalcasting site but not his new one which as you mentioned is alloyavenue. Very inspiring and I would recommend the site to anyone. And thanks for the tip, Im new to metal casting and like anything there is a learning curve. The spoons for the water turbine were some of my first castings, and to be honest I wound up making the whole set at least twice before I was getting some that I was happy with, though still rough. And like I said before Im sure the design isnt perfect either as it was jus what I came up with after viewing some pelton spoons online from different sources.

[whythehecknot]

O.K. Ive got some more pictures of the site and some of the old "popular mechanics" water turbine build that my father in law constructed. Just hit the first link at the top of the page and you should be able to find them. Let me know if you cant for any reason.

[machinemaker]

I think it is great to see you casting. I do bronze casting in ceramic shell molds, but have done some sand casting off and on over the years. I want to cast an impellor for a low head turbine. About 8 months a year we have more than enough steam flow through the pasture to run the house. During the summer it gets a little low, but there is still flow. I am still trying to find good design information of impeller design any suggestions? This fall I was disappointed to see that the local beavers had built a new dam on the upsteam border of our property, just about where I wanted to make a small dam to divert flow. However, having beavers making a much larger dam than I would may be a great blessing. I saves me the hassle of dealing with the county department of natural resources. This beaver dam is three times higher than what I could make to keep any water impound on our land. As it is it flooded the creek bed a good 70 feet upstream to an older, several decades old dam that has a 2 acre pond behind it.  How does one keep beavers healthy?

kent

[whythehecknot]

Well I dont know much about the hydrodynamics of water but it seems to me that an ordinary boat propellor looks suspiciously similar to one of those low head water turbines. It would be an easy thing to place one into a pipe of the proper size to capture the flow of the creek and see if it turns. But there again were is all the fun of making one yourself. Interesting though I noticed when looking at the low flow turbines that some were very high tech , being able to pitch variably depending on water flow.
  Im super jealous that you can cast bronze , iron is my goal that I may never reach, but my next project Im planning to try my hand at a sand casted cannon. Ive made a two piece pattern on the ole wood lathe and am waiting now to find enough material to do the job, oh and I need to buy a real crucible too.
  Too bad you cant go before the beaver board of dam makers and talk them into making you a nice little spillway. They are probly easier to talk to than the department of natural rescources.

[machinemaker]

not sure where you are located, but you might be able to find crucibles and supplies locally. Silicon bronze is a great casting metal and easy to work with. If you can't find casting supplies locally you might try www.mifco.com  I am planning to follow this guys plans   http://stephenchastain.com/  for a cupola for casting iron. I am getting involved with the local antique steam and gas engine society and I want to do some replacement castings for hit and miss engines. The impeller will be cast from silicon bronze so that each blade will be separate from the hub so that I can play around with pitch and placement. Have you ever looked at the old info these folks post: www. frenchriverland.com
kent

[whythehecknot]

Great links, thanks!!! I was going to reply to your last post yesterday but got so caught up in all those pictures from the link.
   Ive found some places that supply metals for a reasonable price. In fact we have just a few towns over from me a really big outfit that will sell just about any type or quantity of metals for cheap. Its just that my budget, or lack of it keeps me scrounging most of the time. 

[keithturtle]

Its just that my budget, or lack of it keeps me scrounging most of the time. 

That's half the fun, finding stuff that you can make work without paying retail.

Dumpster diving should be an Olympic sport; I'd be a bronze-place finisher

Turtle, still at it

[whythehecknot]

Im telling you what!!! I melt down everything around here from soda pop cans to cylinder heads.

[ruddycrazy]

When my dad did sand castings for lathe tools I was amazed at the smoothness of the castings he made and he did say once he had the sand cast finished he put baby powder in the mold to make the sand nice and smooth. Now this was for cast iron but I don't why it wouldn't work for ali casting too. Maybe give it a go next time your casting and see if it will work for you.

Cheers Bryan

[SparWeb]

Hi!
Really want to see more of that sand casting. 
Did one mold in college way way back in the past but never really pictured it as a "backyard" hobby.
Shoulda known better! 
Looking forward to more project photos.
Thank you

[whythehecknot]

I will have to say that at first metal casting looked like something only those with exceptional skills could do. But having broke this anigma ( by doing it myself) I was amazed at just how easy it actually is. There is a learning curve like anything else but once beyond that and once you start getting the hang of things it really comes quite naturally. It opens up ideas that were before impossible or out of reach. Look up the Gingery lathe on google. Its a book that will step by step tell you how to manufacture an entire metal lathe using scrap metal using only a furnace thats fired with charcoal, some sand and wooden patterns. Its a must do on my very long list of project to do list. And Ive heard from those who have built one for themselves that they are very accurate.
  Metal casting to me seemed like the perfect solution to the nagging question as to how one makes a pelton spoon from scratch. My father in law actually had his made for the "big water turbine" by welding two short lengths of pipe together that were cut in half lengthwise. He told me that balancing the thing was an absolute nightmare and it took him over a month to fabricate. In contrast the small spoons I cast were finished in less than a week, and that includes going through several patterns and casting at least twice as many spoons as I needed. I could do it all over again now in less than a day. Bigger spoons would have been easier to cast. I have since then casted a three bladed wind turbine prop thats 58 inches in diameter. And mind you I am a total novice at metal casting and am only modestly skilled with my hands.
  @ Ruddycrazy, I do use talc for my parting lines of the mold and yes Ive heard of people using it for the molds too with good results. And dang isnt it tragic that we didnt watch our fathers more closely when they did things? At least I know there was times when I wished I would have. And it sounds like your father was a very accomplished metal caster.