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plasmahunt3r
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Joined: 10/01/2016
Location: United States
Posts: 10

Posted: 12:54am 11 Oct 2018

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I have a new regulator for my 12V 500W wind turbine. I spent $27 off Ebay for a new 2007 Harley Softail voltage Rectifier/Regulator. I picked the 2007 because the wires are long. The 2008+ Rectifier/Regulators have very short wires. I cut off the plugs and soldered in ring Terminals.

The Harley's put out 3 phase AC up to 38 Amps. The Voltage Rectifier/Regulator is a shunt type regulator that kicks in at 14.5V.

The way this works, is to simply rectify the voltage until the voltage reaches 14.5V, then shunts the excess voltage to ground. I tested the wind gen with a power drill and socket spinning the turbine. When it reached 14.5V, the torque increased on the drill and slowed it down. In this way, that shorting to ground acts as a brake and slows down the wind turbine to keep it from over spinning. Shorting to ground is what a brake switch does, except this is temporary, until the voltage drops below 14.5V.

This results in a self regulating and self braking turbine.

The Harley Rectifier/Regulator should work with higher wattage and voltage turbines as long as you are charging 12V batteries. It all cases, the voltage is clipped at 14.5v and the turbine is slowed.

Madness

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Joined: 08/10/2011
Location: Australia
Posts: 2498

Posted: 12:52am 12 Oct 2018

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Have you considered what will happen in a storm? If the turbine can keep spinning and does not stop or slow down significantly it could burn out your generator.

There are only 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't.

plasmahunt3r
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Joined: 10/01/2016
Location: United States
Posts: 10

Posted: 01:24am 12 Oct 2018

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I mounted the Wind Turbine on my truck and had it up to 50 MPH. The whole purpose of using a shunt type regulator, is to brake the turbine so it doesn't keep spinning uncontrollably. The 3 SCR's in a rectifier/regulator act as a brake and slow down the turbine and limit it's speed.

The SCR's are only on, in the portion of the AC wave, that starts at 14.5V and back down to zero volts. And while the SCR's are on, they act as a brake for that portion of the turbine revolution, slowing it down. When the SCR's turn on, they short out the positive ac wave of each phase, to ground.

In an AC wave, the SCR's turn off when the voltage crosses zero. As the AC wave ramps back up to positive, it will turn on the SCR's if the voltage reaches 14.5v. Each SCR has 1/3 of the total current in a 3 phase AC generator.

I have also been testing altering the battery charge voltage. The manufacturer of my AGM batteries recommended a charging voltage of 13.8v if I am planning to have the batteries as standby batteries. I added a diode between the positive out on the Rectifier/Regulator and the battery. The charge voltage at the battery reduced to 13.9V.

Tinker

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Joined: 07/11/2007
Location: Australia
Posts: 1904

Posted: 09:11am 12 Oct 2018

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All very interesting but "shorting to ground" does not tell me where exactly this energy is dissipated in heat. Does this short heat up some wire or is it a suitable heat sink?
You see, I'm not familiar with Harley regulators (a link would have been helpful - use the icon to the right of the underlined U header on the message page).

Its an interesting method though. Tell me, what happens with the Harley when this thing regulates, does it try to slow down the bike

. This would be a good idea for some bikers hereabouts

Klaus

Solar Mike
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Joined: 08/02/2015
Location: New Zealand
Posts: 1138

Posted: 09:21am 12 Oct 2018

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Interesting, as a bike rider myself I find it unbelievable that any manufacture would create a regulator that effectively shorted the alternator to achieve battery voltage regulation; most of the time the battery would be fully charged, so the bike engine is just wasting petrol trying to turn over a loaded up short circuited alternator.... doesn't make any sense.

It would make better sense if the scr's in the multi phase generator rectifier were turned on later in the 1/2 cycle to lessen the charge current\voltage as the battery became fully charged.

Cheers
Mike

Madness

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Joined: 08/10/2011
Location: Australia
Posts: 2498

Posted: 09:33am 12 Oct 2018

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Maybe it helps them make more noise?

There are only 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't.

Ralph2k6

Senior Member

Joined: 24/09/2017
Location: Australia
Posts: 129

Posted: 09:47am 12 Oct 2018

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A quick tired comment here, I thought the shunting of power from the reg. Is to limit excessive voltage that can be generated as its a magnetically excited windmill..

But there is the aspect of electrical/mechanical loading.

Ralph

plasmahunt3r
Newbie

Joined: 10/01/2016
Location: United States
Posts: 10

Posted: 11:37pm 19 Oct 2018

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The black heat sink device is the Harley Softail Regulator. I feed in into a 2 Farad Capacitor which is parallel with the battery. The cap is there to help with surges, like when the refrigerator kicks in.

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