Paul (Notts)
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 posted on 8/7/10 at 07:16 PM |
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Help required – Home made wind generator
Six of our year 9 pupils at School have just won the east midlands finals with their science and engineering project which is absolutely fantastic,
considering the competition they were up against. We being a local comp and the rest mainly from selective and private schools.
However, as a result they now go forward to the national finals in London next year. This means they have to take their project to the next
level.(They get 3 days in London fully paid for, and possibly me as well.)
As part of the next stage they will have to make a working wind turbine that will power a pump. This pump will then irrigate the schools organic Veg
garden.
I now need some ideas of how to make the wind turbine…Was thinking along the lines of an Alternator being used to charge a car battery. This could
then be used to power the pump.
All parts have to be recycled, so old car alternator and Battery would fit.
Any Ideas Or Help Welcome..
Paul
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Jon Ison
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 07:22 PM |
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These guys are all but next door to us, always lots of bits laid about, pretty close to you also may be worth a
call/visit ? May have some useful pointers particularly on the blade to use, dunno ?
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suparuss
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 07:23 PM |
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their are plans around to make turbine blades for generators out of drain pipe by cutting em in a certain way.
a permanent magnet generator (dynamo?) would work better as car alternators need power to them to work, so if the battery goes flat itll never get
rechared.
why bother with power though? a mechanical pump feeding an elevated reservoir with a drip system would be more efficient.
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Stott
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 07:25 PM |
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You'd have to gear the alternator appropriately as they don't produce until about 1400rpm minimum really.
In a car they are 1:3 stepped up approximately - for average cars (it does change with max rpm of the engine, high revvers are geared lower so the max
alt speed is circa 18000, above which, all sorts happens inside them and they sieze  )
HTH
Stott
[Edited on 8/7/10 by Stott]
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dinosaurjuice
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 07:25 PM |
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saw a really good website with homemade turbine using plastic guttering. gave reasonable power too i remember.
Could you take electrics out the equation, drive a pump directly. fill a tank on stilts and let gravity do the work from then on? just a thought 
edit: too slowww again 
[Edited on 8/7/10 by dinosaurjuice]
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Paul (Notts)
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 07:26 PM |
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Has to invole power as the first stage of their project was to put the idea forward and build a wind generator that would light an LED to show the
principal. Now it has to do its job.
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dinosaurjuice
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 07:27 PM |
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a bicycle hub dynamo would be ideal.
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suparuss
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 07:29 PM |
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why not build your own dynamo then? that would be impressive! i have no idea how btw. probably involves magnets and coils of wire somehow.
Russ.
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kendo
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 07:34 PM |
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What about if you just use the rotary motion of the turbine to drive a shaft thru a bevel gear then belt drive to a waterpump? Might be easier than
the electrical solution. Mind you might get more points for combining technologies.
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Guinness
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 07:41 PM |
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try www.instructables.com for ideas?
Mike
[Edited on 8/7/10 by Guinness]
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britishtrident
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 08:05 PM |
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Best way is purely mechanical ---- crank connected via long co rod to a cross head connected to the piston of a double acting reciprocating pump.
[Edited on 8/7/10 by britishtrident]
[I] “ What use our work, Bennet, if we cannot care for those we love? .”
― From BBC TV/Amazon's Ripper Street.
[/I]
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turboben
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 08:13 PM |
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Not sure how to do the link:
http://autospeed.com/cms/A_111296/article.html
Homemade bicycle dynamo using an old stepper motor.
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turboben
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 08:13 PM |
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OMG! it worked!
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Strontium Dog
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 08:24 PM |
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The first thing you need to do is work out how much power you need so you can size the windmill appropriately. Bear in mind that a bike wheel dyno
might be rated at around 5watts but you won't see that very often.
I have built a few windmills and you might want to look at something like a rewound Lucas AC11 alternator that you can drive direct so no gearbox
losses so that you get enough energy (maybe around 125watts at 12volts (10Amp) IIRC)when the wind is blowing to maintain the battery charge and run a
small irrigation pump! You will only see an average of around 25watts I expect. PM me if I can be of any help to you!
EDIT
I probably still have the plans for the AC11 mill inc. Jigs for the rewinding of the coils. I know I have enough of the correct wire left to wind at
least one more alternator too!
[Edited on 8/7/10 by Strontium Dog]
[Edited on 8/7/10 by Strontium Dog]
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Howlor
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 08:40 PM |
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How about an electric pump to fill a water tower style system. That way you have stored energy/pressure when the wind isn't blowing. A simple
ball cock style switch could stop the pump when the tank is full.
Steve
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matt_gsxr
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 08:40 PM |
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Nice project.
I think charging a battery is a good way to go, it means you can water on a hot day.
You could add some control circuitry using one of the cheap micro-controllers that are so easily available now.
Something like, measuring the temperature and watering on hot days, watering at night, not over watering, not running the pump when the battery is
low, or when there is no water to pump.
I suspect these things would all appeal to a judging panel and are easy to implement. Look for example at
http://www.coolcomponents.co.uk/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=335&gclid=CN3I3afk3KICFYGX2AodzUjgYw
The Arduino boards are amazingly cheap and easy to use.
Matt
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watsonpj
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 09:06 PM |
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I have some stepper motors if you want to try that method or if you want magnets I can supply you with either samarium cobalt (very powerful) or
Neodymium (most powerful). I also believe we have a coil winding machine at work but I've never used it.
drop me a U2U if you want anything
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matt_claydon
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 09:10 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by matt_gsxr
Nice project.
I think charging a battery is a good way to go, it means you can water on a hot day.
You'd achieve the same thing by just pumping the water up to a tank on a 'tower' to store the energy, avoiding the huge losses of
converting mechanical energy to electrical, electrical to chemical, chemical to electrical, and electrical to mechanical again.
Keep the energy mechanical and you save all those inefficiencies.
If the OP is really stuck with using electricity though then a permanent magnet dynamo would seem better than an alternator for the reasons above.
Earlier Beetles and I presume lots of other older cars had dynamos rather than alternators.
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JoelP
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 09:14 PM |
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must say, including a microcontroller would add a level of excellence to the project - worthwhile if you can do it. Maybe just to control the pump
switch to have the tank full first, battery full second.
A tip though, keep the water tank as close to the height of the plant pots as possible to minimise how much work the pump needs to do!
Beware! Bourettes is binfectious.
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graememk
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 09:17 PM |
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you need the motors from an old real to real tape deck
[Edited on 8/7/10 by graememk]
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Breaker
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 09:26 PM |
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A year ago I saw a program on Discovery were they built a piston pump for irrigation and drinking water for cows.
If I remember correctly the used a piston pump. Purely mechanical.
The driving rod was connected to the wind turbine with a simple crankshaft mechanism to convert circular movement to linear movement and it worked
quite well !
The blades were made of aluminum sheet. Possibly you can also pump the water to a higher positioned tank so you can still irrigate when there is no
wind.
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NigeEss
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 09:39 PM |
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I've a photocopy of a project called called "Scrapyard Windpower".
Can recopy it for you.
Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.................Douglas Adams.
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BenB
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 09:53 PM |
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I also think converting movement to electricity and back is a bit of a waste. Makes more sense to just power a pump via bevel gears.
Now the genius way to water stuff is to use a clack valve. That's plain crazy.
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loggyboy
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 10:08 PM |
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Ummm shouldnt the kids be thinking up ideas? I guess the paid invite doesnt extend to any of us???!!!
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bbwales
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| posted on 8/7/10 at 10:27 PM |
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I saw a hotel on one of the Cayes in Belize where it was purely powered by a wind turbine which was home made.
He used the tail rotor off a helicopter coupled to a 90amp alternator (off a FFR Landrover) this then charged a bank of batteries and everything in
the hotel was either 12 or 24 volts, very clever and not that expensive to set up as he got everything from the dump at the British camp .
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