Your Questions About Wind Turbine Generators

admin answers:

Hey Marcus, there are two reasons, cost and efficiency. The old grain mills had to transmit the torque to the building at the bottom mechanically, they didn’t have electric generators and voltage regulators in those days, if they did, they would certainly have run a pair of wires down that tower instead of some gears and push rods. The other reason, efficiency, is a bigger player today than it was 100 years ago. Most modern turbines today, which generally have 3 long slender blades instead of a dozen or so square metal ones can convert about one third of the energy in the moving column of air to electricity. The old style turbines you saw on farms centuries ago were maybe 5% efficient. The other reason for those big rectangular blades was starting torque, mainly to start the water pump. They were not interested in having the thing run well, or at all in 100 mph winds with tremendous RPM’s, it would simply destroy the entire mechnism.

We run our home on solar and wind right now. Our wind turbine is a commercially made unit a little bigger than a ceiling fan, but can develope almost 1000 watts in good wind. It is small and light enough to take up to the top of the tower in a backpack and install by hand with ordinary hand tools, that was the main reason we selected it. For our home, we should have a larger one, maybe 1500 watts or so, but the weight of the generator almost requires the use of a small crane at that point. I do not know of anyone using helicopters to install or service rotors today. The large commercial ones actually have ladders built into the inside of the tower, and space to work inside the tower top housing. Smaller ones like mine either go on a Rohns Guyed Lattice tower, or similar type of tower, which has a ladder built into the framing for climbing, or they use a crane truck to reach the top.

In our experience the last 11 years, the only thing that needs periodic service is the electronics, regulators, and batteries, which in our case is at the bottom of the tower. In fact, those devices are all in our battery room in the garage. Our previous turbine was a smaller unit with the generator and electronics all in the housing. Each time the regulator burned up or malfunctioned, the entire unit had to come off the top of the tower. This was the main reason we upgraded to the unit we have now. Exposure to the elements, gusty winds and even lightning never seem to bother the generator itself, so we make very few trips up the tower these days. Take care Marcus, Rudydoo

admin answers:

Here is a great website if your looking to make your own wind turbine at home.

Www.Squidoo.com/HomeMade-Green-energy