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Forum Index : Other Stuff : Greetings from a new member
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luddite42 Newbie  Joined: 01/07/2009 Location: AustraliaPosts: 6 |
We are building our own home completely off the grid and have a solar system. We get great wind here and the plan was to always add wind power to the system but due to the expense of the commercial units it hasn't happened yet. I had always wondered about the viability of building my own generator as it didn't sound to hard in theory and it doesn't appear to be that difficult in practise. If anyone is interested in having a look at the solar setup we have you can see it at buildingourhome.blogspot.com The system consists of 8 x 185 watt sony(I think) solar panels 1 x 9hp diesel generator 24 x 2V sonnenschein batteries (28.8KWH total storage) 1 x 6KW inverter for 240volt I need to do something soon about wind as the generator has run every night for the last week(shockingly black weather here in SA lately) but the wind has been going strong every night. PS: the inverter has input for wind to be plugged straight in. It is just a matter of getting the right sort of input for it from the windmill |
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oztules Guru  Joined: 26/07/2007 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1686 |
Windmills are relatively cheap to build yourself. The tower will probably be the biggest outlay (depending on location) The dynamics between all the things that make a windmill work well are very complex and in some cases counter intuitive. If you follow a proven design (eg, Hugh Piggott or the Dans from other power... both with excellent books as well as net details), then it is a walk in the park. If you choose to reinvent the wheel.. the path to a good useable design is fraught with pitfalls.... don't do it until you build a known design first. It is one thing to experiment for the hell of it, it is another thing if you depend on the power for day to day living. Build a proven axial flux design as big as you can reasonably manage, and run it to the batteries independent of the inverter. This will protect the inverter from any unintended results from the mill, and you can then provide the mill with dump load yourself. Probably the Dans are providing the best design, as they live the dream. If your only playing with it , then an F&P would be the best entry level, and will provide useable power, but to my knowledge, nothing can beat the dual axials for low and medium wind performance... which is where most of the reliable power is, and high power performance is very good too. The F&P runs well in the mid winds, and is cheaper to build, but for off grid living I would prefer to get the most out of the infrastructure... which is usually much more than the mill. ...........oztules Village idiot...or... just another hack out of his depth |
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| luddite42 Newbie Joined: 01/07/2009 Location: AustraliaPosts: 6 |
I actually made a mis-statement in my post there isn't a section for the wind to plug into the inverter as generated power is fed to the batteries and the batteries then feed to the inverter. I wouldn't attempt to reinvent the wheel but I could prove to be of some use with simple computer stuff. I was reading a little about the PicAxe stuff and found it somewhat interesting. |
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MacGyver Guru Joined: 12/05/2009 Location: United StatesPosts: 1329 |
"The tower will probably be the biggest outlay (depending on location) " I know a nifty way to make a strong, yet easily-serviceable tower: Imagine the letter "H" with an extra cross-bar. The legs are made of steel pipe and are buried in the ground in concrete. The cross bars are pipes. The top one serves as a hinge. The lower one is used to "pin" the thing in the vertical position The easiest way to build this and have it work properly is to weld everything together on a flat surface, then once it's built, use a plumb bob and get the thing stuck in the ground at 90-degrees to the horizontal (ground surface). Then use your saws-all and cut out spaces in the cross pipes to accommodate the pins. Everything is welded together before it is set into the concrete. Once it's set up and solid, saw the cross members to allow the tower to hinge on the top one. As stated, the lower one just pins things in place. A large (heavy) weight is attached at the bottom of the pole (tower) which sits in the center between the posts. I used pre-cast concrete with a tang and bolted it to the pole's base. When you want to service whatever is on top, all you do is pull the lower pin and let gravity do most of the work. To get it back up, use ropes or friends. If you choose the later, it's customary to have loads of beer available to celebrate your accomplishment! I made one like this in Florida, cause sometimes the wind blows gale- force and above. That's when you want your windmill to sit it out down on the ground! Hope this helps someone out there. Nothing difficult is ever easy! Perhaps better stated in the words of Morgan Freeman, "Where there is no struggle, there is no progress!" Copeville, Texas |
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colej Newbie Joined: 01/08/2009 Location: United StatesPosts: 1 |
My first time to this board and it looks like some good info here so I joined up. My interest is mainly in Wind, but any way I can figure to "Shove them 'lectrons" back into a battery is fine with me. You can all go to Hell and I will go to Texas - D. Crockett |
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GWatPE Senior Member  Joined: 01/09/2006 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2127 |
Hi Luddite42, Are U still having problems with you system. The approx 30kW stored energy and 1.5kW solar should give a few days autonomy. What type of inverter and solar maximizer? The battery recharging reigime of many RE systems is non optimum unless the factory defaults are adjusted. The systems I have investigated had too conservative charging voltages and this resulted in much reduced battery capacity. I may be able to assist as I am in SA. Gordon. become more energy aware |
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| luddite42 Newbie Joined: 01/07/2009 Location: AustraliaPosts: 6 |
The Inverter is a Power Solutions Australia RAP-5-48. Not sure what you mean by a solar maximiser? Off the top of my head the Inverter will shut itself down when the batteries hit 47.6V and will start the generator up at 48.6V (and when a large load is placed upon it). Unfortunately since my last post the generator walked across the Inverter shed floor through vibration and this disconnected a wire from the inverter to the generator now it just cranks over but the solenoid gets no power(this is only when the Inverter requests it to start) and I am having to manually start it when necessary (which is a pain in the you know where). We get heaps of wind here and so i would be insane not to add some sort of wind generation to the system. We are at Eden Valley in the Adelaide Hills. if you so desire you can email me directly at colinjrose@gmail.com but I am not online every day so it may be a day or two before I respond to any missives. |
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| luddite42 Newbie Joined: 01/07/2009 Location: AustraliaPosts: 6 |
To GWatPE Still hoping to hear from you |
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