My Experience with Wind Turbines

[Dagoth Ur Does Solar]

OP you have put a lot of work into this one, I thought solar was a learning experience but dealing with your entire tower falling down at one point... That would probably spook me from wanting to pursue the hobby any further.

The non-traditional materials are pretty cool. These DIY wind turbine threads are always fun reads from an engineering perspective.

Not something I would ever do, my optimization-focused brain tells me that it would make no sense for me to go through any pains to make a turbine or buy one when I could just add more solar. But it's still a cool project.

 

[SparWeb]

Thanks.
The bottom-line view is that solar is simple reliable and just works.
But - they don't do anything interesting, either...
WT's on the other hand are just interesting to watch.

 

[Madcodger]

I hear the wind outside and think, "Man, that's a lot of energy I could capture. Then I read this thread and think, "Man, that's time and patience I just don't have." Thanks for helping me resist temptation! I admire your effort, but I think I'm sticking with the boring, reliable stuff.

 

[brandnewb]

My comments were limited to their kWh production, not their durability although I had a fair amount of trouble keeping them running (making kWh)

Why can no one send me a screen shot of thier wind turbine's last 12 months or last 5 years of production? Not one person has ever done that and I've been asking and looking for YEARS. You've sent more than anyone has and even then is just a one or two year snapshot.


It is troubling and that's why I've been constant of voice of "show me the data" for all wind turbine manufacturers. I really don't think I'm being unreasonable.

If you keep your eye on thier list of dealers you'll see than few if any have been dealers for more than a few years. I haven't checked thier list but every time I do the names in my state and those nearby are all new. Like me, I assume they quickly figure out the same thing I did and don't want thier name associated with Bergey.

In my and others experience, Bergey sits on atop a pedestal that they really shouldn't be on.


Thanks!

One thing people who've not use wind don't realize is just how variable it is. EG: (just eyeballing) In below February the XL1 made almost 50% of energy during it's 7 best days. And then it spent 15 days making at less than 3 kWh/day.

Continuing to look at the daily production over a 12 month period you'll see that it spent over 50% of it's time making less than 2kWh/day. That's a lot of work to get what a 350 watt solar panel would do at most locations year around for 20 years or longer. (you know all that already)

99% of the Bergey XL1 didn't make more than a few years until serious problems started showing up. If there's any alive today I'd be quite surprised. To be fair it was made in China and Bergey fought terribly to get that manufacturer to build them what they promised they would. Still it wouldn't change the kWh, only the lifetime.


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I might know why. But I can never prove it.

Look we all want to feel pride in what we do.

I am no different.
But my starting point was one from frustration with the results I have seen on roofs and more close by.

That is a starting point in where it is paramount to be able to demonstrate things as to make sure all (well reasoned/experienced) community members can accept my reports.

I am even going to up it one notch. I am going to build the same generators and see how they perform.
If I can ever get this damned test setup to rotate reliably.

 

[brandnewb]

@SparWeb I no longer believe that the traditional setup will perform less than my quasimodo attempt at doing something differently.

But can you please confirm the basic details of the PMA that has been writen about?

Like what diam, what magnets at what distance from each other (rotor disk wise (basically how much air gap)), what wire size @ how many turns.

What I really want to do is to be able to have a walk of shame;

OK ok ok gang,

I thought I could outsmart the established masters but see how wrong I was. Here this is the data.

Now in that case no one on the traditional side would give a beep.

Yet consider the following;

Hmm ok gang. I think my setup outperforms the tradition. Here is why I think that.;
and then data is given of course.,

especially when I go and compare my own setup of a traditional configuration.

Then all of a sudden all is attacked like yeah but you did not use the correct magnets, not the correct wire diam and not the correct exaxt type of steel backing and you did not not use the ......


see my point?

 

[brandnewb]

ok F%^ this.

I want to stand on the right side of the future. That means on your side @SparWeb

Sparweb's only omission is that he did not take the data needed to get us all riled up.

But come on men!!. If you really look at those towers and those blades then there is at least something we can expect out of it.

What I do not see fitting in its entirety though is the use of an off the shelf PMA while we are on a DIY forum.

Yeah Yeah I am also crossing that boundary many times and there should be a moment in time when we just stop caring about 100%DIY.

 

[brandnewb]

How about we all democratically agree on a standard of data providing?

I hope my current way of data relaying is a good first suggestion.

 

[brandnewb]

I forgot to mention though that that PMA nacelle looks remarkably similar to the one that got me started here years ago. Yes it looks bigger but I can't shake the feeling it is from the same factory.

 

[Majestik]

Hello, I am new to this technology. How would you wire up the 3 24V-200aH batteries for two small wind turbines?
I am trying to power the entire apartment. Both turbines are 1500W.

 

[mvonw]

Can you comment on how many birds you've killed? I keep reading about how these are avian death traps..

 

[OzSolar]

 

[Crowz]

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Damn turbines need to step up their game. They don't even rate honorable mention. Stupid participation trophy types for sure

 

[NC_hydro]

Can you comment on how many birds you've killed? I keep reading about how these are avian death traps..

Don’t believe everything you read. Especially from the environmental lobbyists

 

[OzSolar]

Hello, I am new to this technology. How would you wire up the 3 24V-200aH batteries for two small wind turbines?
I am trying to power the entire apartment. Both turbines are 1500W.

What? You are punking us, right? Apartment and two 1500 watt wind turbines can't possibly go in the same sentence. Oh, and welcome to the forum! Cautionary advice: folks who ask about wind turbines tend to get beat up, mostly by me, so feel free to ignore me. I'll get the hint and leave you alone pretty quickly.

 

[OzSolar]

Here's what those cedar blades that I carved in 2009 looked like, when I finally took them off in 2019. 10 years had scoured all of the varnish off, and there were even dents from hail, splits and cracks, too. Despite that, the WT was running well. By the data logger, the performance was not significantly degraded.
Obviously it was just a matter of time before something would fail, so these blades were retired with honor. The generator was still running well (replaced the bearings again!) and I didn't need to update the tail, either. Just grease it a little.

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That summer I had been carving a new set. The data logger had not only helped me measure performance, but also determine that I could put even bigger blades on the generator. The caveat was that I had to curve the blades substantially to ensure they were optimized for slow speed.


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Let's think about getting this thread back to OP's talking points or moving it to a new one. Some very impressive stuff that they shared with us and we've completely lost site of that.