Author Topic: My "new to me" old Jacobs 110 volt 3000 watt wind generator  (Read 2777 times)

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jenkinswt

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My "new to me" old Jacobs 110 volt 3000 watt wind generator
« on: August 20, 2017, 10:32:10 PM »
Just made a long road trip to pickup a Jacobs Wind Generator with the family. Still tired but excited! I have a few other projects to get done first but hope to start working on this soon.

We got it all unloaded tonight when we got home and spun it by hand and haven't seen anymore than 7 volts, is there a cut in speed where it starts producing a higher voltage? Anyone know a good place to find any parts or part numbers? I'm mainly looking for bearings, etc. I'm hoping it doesn't need a rewind, I probably couldn't afford that right now. The blades are pretty rough, I am planning either carving new ones or trying to fiberglass these but don't want to make them really heavy.

This has the newer blade furling setup with springs instead of the flyballs. I will appreciate any and all information anyone has on these, especially the 110 volt models. I was going to attach some pictures but took them with my camera and the file size is too big. I will take some different ones later and post them.

hiker

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Re: My "new to me" old Jacobs 110 volt 3000 watt wind generator
« Reply #1 on: August 23, 2017, 02:41:06 AM »
Wincharger.com May be of some help.....
WILD in ALASKA

jenkinswt

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Re: My "new to me" old Jacobs 110 volt 3000 watt wind generator
« Reply #2 on: August 23, 2017, 11:43:27 AM »
Right now I have carefully disassembled everything, dang is everything heavy! I have the armature out and don't see anything burnt but maybe a little insulation on the front of the wiring is degrading. There are 6 field coils and when I hook my multimeter to them on ohms it zeros out. Not sure if I am really testing them correctly. The insulation on the field coils does look pretty dark, not sure if that's the problem.

On the armature windings the wires appear to have a few different colors like green, etc. not sure if they used different colored wiring to help when winding or if there's a problem there? I found a large electric repair shop about 90 miles away that can test it all so I might go that route but I am afraid its going to be really expensive. If the field coils are the only problem I would be willing to try this but the armature probably needs a shop. Heres a few pictures, most of them I have taken are still too large to post.

hiker

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Re: My "new to me" old Jacobs 110 volt 3000 watt wind generator
« Reply #3 on: August 23, 2017, 07:27:35 PM »
seems to me it needs some external power ..to power up your field coils...try hitting the field cols with a few volts--6-12 ? looks all good otherwise...the currant you did see when spun by hand..was just some left over magnatizam in the field coils ;;that weakly powered up the rotor...ile bet it would work just fine -once powered up correctly...hit the field coils with a few volts...then spin by hand or hand drill.....
WILD in ALASKA

joestue

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Re: My "new to me" old Jacobs 110 volt 3000 watt wind generator
« Reply #4 on: August 23, 2017, 08:02:31 PM »
since its a dc machine, even if you have a few shorted turns in the field, and the field shorted to the case, you should still be able to get it electrically functional. those windings look good and i don't know if those machines were even capable of burning out the generator.


the field coils should be near zero ohms, and cheap multimeters are not good at detecting anything less than about 10 times the resistance the meter displays when you short the probes to themselves, which is usually .3  to .7 ohms. so they are only reliable to about 10 ohms.

if you like, i can explain to you how to make a milliohm meter accurate from 1 to .001 ohms with any cheap digital scale. they are about 3$ on ebay and you don't even need a soldering iron to make the modification, though it would be somewhat retarded to not solder the joints.....
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jenkinswt

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Re: My "new to me" old Jacobs 110 volt 3000 watt wind generator
« Reply #5 on: November 19, 2017, 04:42:36 PM »
Okay its been a little while since an update, although I did have a separate post about the tower. I've been trying to get all the little details finished up. I have assembled the 48' portion of the tower, have the generator, tail, etc. all together on the stub tower, painted, greased, reworked the slip ring assembly with a new cord, made a pvc junction box. This Friday I hope to have a crane come if the weather cooperates and will get the whole assembly up there. I have a few different questions if anyone can help.

This has the springs for the blade furling, 3 of them and they all 3 seem really stiff. Is this normal? I can't even tell if I can pull one apart by hand so I don't see how they will work. Does anyone know if there is a certain spring rate? I figured old springs would get softer, not stiffer but I am starting to wonder if they should be replaced some how.

Another spring issue I am wondering is the long spring for the tail. Even with the tail sideways with the safety chain holding it I couldn't stretch it enough by hand to hook it up. I had to take the safety chain off and hook it up and then it took a second person to help turn the tail straight enough to hook the safety chain. I have enough of the original pull chain to go through the stub tower but with the force it appears to take to turn this, I am wondering about switching to cable completely since I will need to get enough to reach a hand winch anyways.

On the tower, its a 48' 3 leg angle iron tower original with the wind generator. + the 5' stub tower. The very top section is 8' with diagonal braces from 40-44' and 44'-48' the top 44-48' diagonal braces do not have a adjustable bracket and one strap appears to have some slop in it. There was one strap missing and I made a new one but its not the one that looks loose. I am starting to wonder if the one that was missing was adjustable and that one strap would maybe tension the other 5 up? I've looked around everywhere and haven't found another tower to compare it to.

As far as charging my 48 volt bank with the 140 volt output I have a midnite classic 150 that I currently use with the solar that I will borrow and see how it works, might need to go to a midnite 200 anyways.  I was going to use a blocking diode in between the generator and controller. I don't know if the furling on the Jacobs works good enough to not have a dump load. I think I can use a ssr for diversion from the classic to turn on heating elements or a heater. Not sure if this is a good enough of an approach or not. I will probably watch it like a hawk also and shut it down before any real bad winds hit until I am comfortable with it. I'm just about finished painting the blades, I had to completely fiberglass them. If I had to do it over again with not having heat in my shed I would have just carved new wooden blades, which I still might down the road.




Harold in CR

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Re: My "new to me" old Jacobs 110 volt 3000 watt wind generator
« Reply #6 on: November 20, 2017, 05:50:16 PM »

 Can't help about the tower. The springs are very stiff. Centrifugal force is what they have to overcome from "throwing" the blades off their shafts in higher winds. When I copied the same system, I bought "field tiller" springs from a farm supply and cut them down to a shorter length.  They worked very well keeping the RPM's to around 220 to keep my 1800 RPM alternator at correct speed using a 10 to 1 gearbox. I would guess they were 3/8" thick or so round stock.You can't even bend them sideways by hand.

 I tested without a load in high winds and the top speed did not get excessive. Same for the tail spring. It's unreal what the wind can do at 30 MPH high off the ground. We mounted a "Dakota Wind and Sun" copy of a Jacobs on our own tower top. I would suggest all top braces would be same length and all solidly connected, as long as the gen sits level as possible so it doesn't yaw to a low side at dead wind conditions.

jenkinswt

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Re: My "new to me" old Jacobs 110 volt 3000 watt wind generator
« Reply #7 on: November 20, 2017, 07:53:31 PM »
I've came to that same conclusion today messing around with it all. I noticed once the tail is straight it doesn't take alot of force on the chain to hold it there. Also the blade furling only has to extend the springs about 3/4". I think on the tower I am going to use a turnbuckle and make a different strap so I can tighten it up. I ordered a blocking diode, hand winch and cable. I'm sure I am overthinking some of this but want to get it right.

I'll probably post a diary with lots of pictures of everything when I'm done.

SparWeb

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Re: My "new to me" old Jacobs 110 volt 3000 watt wind generator
« Reply #8 on: November 23, 2017, 02:08:32 PM »
Looking forward to that, J
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jenkinswt

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Re: My "new to me" old Jacobs 110 volt 3000 watt wind generator
« Reply #9 on: November 26, 2017, 06:48:29 PM »
Friday didn't work it was too windy. Just got it craned up there. Its a bit of a struggle to get bolts started in the air but it went pretty smooth and the crane operator was great. We had some family over also which was nice. Here's a picture for now and when I get more time I will try to do a diary. Thanks for everyone's help on here.