Vertical Axis Wind Turbine

While surfing the net I ran across some videos on generating electricity from the wind and/or solar panels. This idea really intrigued me and I started looking for more information about this green power. I'd always considered wind and solar energy way too expensive for me to try at this point but to my surprise I found many videos of homemade generators using recycled materials found around the house! (for wind anyway)

I figured, what the heck. It would be kind of cool to generate my own electricity, however humble. If I could light just one light bulb I'd be happy! The only thing I know about electricity is when you flip the switch up, the light turns on and when you flip the switch down the light goes off. Other than that, I know nothing.  But I'm going to learn! 

Having watched lots of videos on youtube I decided the Vertical Axis Wind Turbine (VAWT) seemed to be one that I had a chance at building and maybe even have some success at lighting that bulb. 

So, yesterday I started building my prototype. I spent the entire day trying to get my band saw to work. Very frustrating. The first step of my VAWT project hit a giant snag. I needed to cut two circles of plywood for the top and bottom of my turbine. I always use my band saw to cut circles. It's quick and easy to get perfectly round pieces of wood on any other day. But yesterday, my band saw decided to be the temperamental  diva of my shop. After cleaning the entire machine, replacing the tires, blade and fine-tuning the tension, the darn thing still wouldn't work. After about 6 hours of tweaking and adjustments, I decided that the best course of action at that point was to have a couple beers and relax in the living room for the remainder of the day. 

Undaunted by yesterdays lack of production I headed straight to the shop to dive into the band saw without care. Well, for some reason, today, my good old band saw was back. I still had a couple of hiccups but I just closed my eyes and plowed forward! Finally, after a day and a half, I had two circles of plywood!! 

Now that the plywood was cut I layed out the position of the roters on the plywood. The total height of my turbine is 27". It is a little shy of 24" round. I have 16 roters, each 4" wide. I'm trying a 45 degree angle for each roter, I don't know how well that angle will work but this is just a prototype so I'm expecting to make adjustments based on the RPMs . Since I don't have a wind tunnel I have to use the trial and error method! 

Below is a picture of my prototype. The next step is to 'dry mount' it for some field testing. That will probably be next weekend because I still need to work out how to mount this beast to get the best performance. 

Any comments and or tips would be appreciated! 

Picture of Prototype Vertical Axis Wind Turbine

Saturday August 13,2011
Today I rigged up a frame to hold my wind turbine. I used a wooden pallet for the base and some 2x4's for the verticals. Crude but effective. Since this is a prototype I'm not spending much time making everything tidy. I used wooden dowels into bearings for the axles on both ends. Seemed to work ok for now. When I build the permanent turbine these will be metal.

Here's a shot of the turbine in action. We had some weather coming in so there was a nice breeze and the turbine worked fairly well considering it was close to the ground and about 30 feet from the wood line. I need to find a more open area to install it for good. And raise it up, maybe only 8 feet in the air but I think it will catch a lot more wind there.

http://www.virginiabird.com/Other/Vertical-Axis-Wind-Turbine/18425485_mHQxZF#1429005231_s8sMqvS-A-LB

Until I can find a motor I'll be tweaking the turbine. I was expecting the turbine to start turning with lighter winds. We don't get much wind here so the lower it can start turning the better. I'm guessing that I got about 60 rpm (peak) today. I'll need more than that to start generating power. I may have to start thinking about gearing.  I'm also thinking of making the blades longer and maybe add some 'scoops' on the back of the blades.

All in all I'm pretty happy with the turbine. It did turn after all. I was a bit afraid when the bearings were not turning very smoothly when I hand tested them. They were used and very dirty. I'll get new ones for the real turbine. Should be perfect! 



  

The Back Forty

This year I finally got around to putting in a vegetable garden. I affectionately refer to it as 'the back forty'. It is about 25' x 20'.  It's been years since I've had a garden and I was a bit apprehensive that I would be growing deer food. After a little thought and the hard work of my sister, We have a couple of gardens.

The back forty is all vegetables, the front 10 is mostly herbs with a few vegetables and sunflowers thrown in. 

I'll try to get out this weekend to get some better photos but for now here's a few to show the bounty! 

This first photo is my sister showing off the radish harvest. Man, those puppies where hot! I built the fence to keep the rabbits out. It took me almost a month. I could only work on it a couple of hours each weekend. LOTS of rocks. But it is finally done for now (I've got big plans). I left the fence posts high so I can use them for trellises in the future. This year we didn't plan at all so there are plants all over the place with nowhere to walk. We'll do better next season. 

We wanted to keep the garden close to the house so we didn't have to lug water too far. 

We have peas, cukes, beans, squash, watermelon, tomatoes, radish, cabbage, onions, carrots and leeks in the back forty. See what I mean by over-planting! So far, so good, but I've started to go vertical. The shot above was about a month ago. I'll get out this weekend to get some shots of the jungle as it is now! 

We planted the herbs in the front garden. We put it right over the septic tank, but I don't think that will be any problem (I hope!) 

Here's a shot of the sunflower that seems to have 7 blooms. I didn't know they would produce more than one blossom per plant. Go figure! This is the first time I've grown sunflowers and I must say that I think I'm hooked! They are very cool and very big flowers! 

I'm planning on planting many more sunflowers next year. I'll plant one with each row of veggies to help attract bees. They are bee magnets! Plus, with the cost of sunflower seeds, it will help save on the cost of keeping my bird feeders full! 

That's it for now. I hope to get out this weekend to get better pictures of both gardens. 

The heat wave hit here in Warrenton today. Almost 99 degrees with a heat index of 113. It's only day one and is supposed to last through Sunday. If you want to keep track of how hot it is here, click on my weather station. The link is on the right side of this blog, labeled "Old Waterloo Road". It shows you the data from my backyard weather station and updates about every 5 minutes.