IM with you Green.... I think there is most certainly a limit in the diameter of these things as centrifugal force at hyper speeds is a real issue. Tesla Turbines eat and love speed. So unlike a diesel engine, slowing it down to deal with materials inability to handle forces isnt really an option. IM not even sure if there is any really benefit to larger diameters. Once you have reached a size where the incoming energy source transmits all its motion energy to the blades, bigger is just less efficient I would think. IM half talking out of my ass here and would like to hear what Don thinks about the "bigger diameter is better" idea and is there much to be gained (or anything) from larger diameters. ?? Final thought... If I was going to try and increase power of a TT, I would not expand diameter like that. I would expend blades horizontal along the shaft axis minimizing problems with centrifugal force exceeding the material tolerance while still increasing the surface area for increase energy input. Thats my two cents in the form of a question. Don, I am anxious to hear what you think. ....
@@timothyjones9430 Tesla stated he built a 500 hp, 60 inch, 15 disk turbine to run at 3600 rpm. At that RPM a 60 inch disk would have a tip speed around 645 miles per hour which is less than the speed of sound (sonic) and much less than hyper speed of around 3000 miles per hour. Small diameter Tesla turbines eat and love speed because they need that speed to form a tight spiral of the combustion gases. It is the tight spiral of the combustion gases that give the turbine the power, otherwise the gases would just take the shortest route from the inlet to the exhaust. With 60 inches of diameter the spirals would not need to be as tight or make as many "loops" around the turbine to travel the same distance around a smaller disk. And with a 60 inch disk with the gases making fewer loops would not cause power loss/waste because the gases would have already delivered the useful energy to the disks by the time it flowed out the exhaust. When it comes to any engine, bigger is better or rather bigger is more efficient. The gas turbines that power model airplanes run at 90K+ rpm, a large engine on a Boeing 737 or 747 run around 10K rpm. The whole reason Tesla wanted a 3600 rpm turbine was to have it turn an ac generator which would output 60hz without reduction gearing.
@@joelvoss1226 I like your input here ... seems realistic , but do you think the Tesla is even capable of competing with modern turbines ... efficiency maybe , but what about power to weight... What is really discouraging it the fact that we see so many people start experimenting with this and just disappears .. So my logic is telling me that is not working out that well.. I love the TT, i want to build one too ... but i cant find anyone that has shown decent results .. Don is practical ,but production skills are lacking a bit , then you get people with amazing production skills but the mess around with 3d print the whole time ...
@@RJ_S_182 I'll take your points up one at a time. 1. Yes, the TT can compete with modern turbines *in some ways* but not in others. Where the TT does really well is *power to cost ratio* . Modern turbines not only use exotic metals but the grain (like the grain of wood) structure is highly engineered and the ceramic coating is space age technology. This allows the modern turbine to run at temperatures that would otherwise melt the metal. So with modern turbines you have sky-high temperatures which give sky-high pressure resulting in sky-high power output with low weight and the costs are also....sky-high. The modern turbines, like a jet engine, do have better power to weight ratio though. 2. Everything I said in #1 above is very important *only* when using a turbine for automobile, train and airplane transportation - power to weight ratio. But once the turbine is used for stationary power generation it does not matter if a modern turbine weighs 3X and the TT weighs 5X. By the way - a diesel with same power output will weigh around 25X. Even in marine transportation the weight is not much of a factor unless it is a very high-speed vessel. 3. You are correct when you say many people did experimenting and then nothing. You say your logic is telling you it is not working out well. Your logic is fine but it is missing data. 99% of those experimenters were only doing "proof of concept" meaning that they are simply showing that one can make a TT spin. Most never even put on any load and only a few of the ones that put on a load made any attempt to measure the load. The fact that most use compress air to "test" the TT shows that they were just playing around because they had no thermal activity going on. So it not that this did not go well, it's just that those experimenters accomplished when they set out to do. It comes down to intention - what do you intend to do with the TT you want to build? Do you want it to generate electricity? How much electricity? How often, a few hours a week, 5 days a week or non-stop? Do you want it to power a boat? What you want it to do will determine what you build. 4. I have not seen anyone on UA-cam build a working TT exactly the way Tesla said to build it. They take shortcuts, building it an "easier or "cheaper" way. Look at Tesla's patents. Look at the those detailed drawings and read the detailed writing he wrote in the patent. Look at the size of the bearings he had on his turbine shafts. 5. How do you plan to power your TT? Gas or steam? I doubt steam unless you have a boiler. A boiler to make steam for 1kw I guess one could do a homemade one. If you want 25KW you will need higher pressures which mean higher temperatures and more danger so will also require some controls. All that means a lot more $. You say Don's production skills are lacking. That is not really fair. Don has a business and he wants a way to burn stuff and not make a lot of pollution so he built a gasifier which burns materiel at high temperature and low oxygen which produces thick smoke which is then mixed with fresh air and burned again to produce a clean burning blue flame. He simply wanted to have a way to use that heat so, I suppose he experimented with different turbines as a way to use steam from the gasifier. But here is the problem, he is trying to use low pressure steam to turn a low RPM turbine to generate no more than 10kw. Those parameters are not very compatible. A 10kw TT is small so it needs to run at high RPM to be efficient - upwards of 25,000 RPM. To do that it needs a small amount of high pressure steam. Don uses low pressure steam to run a turbine ( in one video of his largest TT) no more than around 6,500 RPM. That is very inefficient. So why not run the TT at 25,000 RPM or faster? Here are a few reasons: A: In the U.S.A a generator has to spin at 3600 RPM if it is a 2 pole generator or 1800 RPM if it is a 4 pole generator if it is going to *efficiently* output utility grade electricity. So how do you get a 25,000 or 35,000 RPM turbine to output 3600 RPM? You have to use a custom gearbox or at least an uncommon one which means they are not mass-produced and are therefore *expensive* . B. So a turbine which outputs 10kw to a generator is small so it needs to run at very high RPM. That means special bearings each with its own oil supply which means an oil pump and a cooling radiator for the oil. Do you see that on Don's turbines? Nope. He uses greased-packed (low RPM) wheel bearings unless he just greases the shaft, I can't tell which from the video. If he wanted to take any of his turbines up to 25,000 RPM those store-bought bearings would melt. Buying high-speed bearings of the size he needs are not mass-produced and while an oil pump can be cheap the one of the right size he needs would be a custom order and therefore *expensive* . Take a look at this video - this guy took his TT up to around 10,000RPM with regular greased wheel bearings (at best) and at that speed they did not even last 10 seconds. And he was using compressed air. ua-cam.com/video/yYy3-BZ7n1Y/v-deo.html While you are looking at that video look at the way they guy designed the exhaust and the way he designed the intake nozzle! That is not even close to how Tesla said to build it. C. So now Don has a 60 inch 15 disk TT. That will run at 3600 efficiently. But it is a big waste to only run a 10kw generator on it both in terms of cost of building the TT and that most of the energy would go to turning the TT even without a load. Put another way, it might take 4kw just it idle that TT. 6. Unless you already have a supply of steam or water (like from a boiler or waterfall or dam) you will want to use a gas TT. Tesla has a patent with detailed drawings for that as well. It won't need a boiler but the temperatures will be very high. You will need special metals like stainless steel and you may need to ceramic coat (NOT ceramic paint) the disks and the interior of the turbine casing depending on how much power you want to output. So, if you just want a 5kw engine to power a generator in case of the power going out a TT is not worth it. If you want a 300-400 kw generator (500hp) to run most of the time then a TT can be worth it. Keep in mind a small high RPM TT used daily could cost several thousand dollars and you will have to design it and you will pay for any mistakes you make. Now you know why most of those experimenters did not take it further. It's not that it can't be done. It's just cheaper not to build one compared to just buying a generator set for camping or emergency temporary use at home. Buy the way, a $750.00 5kw emergency generator will not run at 80% power for 300 days - it would be scrap metal long before that. A gas powered $3,000.00 TT putting out 5kw could last a decade. My best advice to you would be to study what Tesla wrote and was quoted as saying. Build it the way he said to build it. If that is beyond your skill level and finances then don't attempt it until your skills and finances are up to it.
@@joelvoss1226 Hi... geeze you went all out with your reply... thanks for your time.. So just to clarify, when i say Don's production skills, im referring to the vid quality... a cam hopping around, dark rooms etc where you cant really see anything.. just setting your cam up on a tripod would already assist and so on.. the production of his vid is basically holding a cam and talking , and i just wished he'd put a bit more effort into it. But anyway. So to get to the turbine itself, i understand what Don is attempting with a large TT to get low RPM, and yes, that means high KW to make it work propperly and that makes 100% sense to me... The thing with most of the youtube TT's is they are small, and yes i get what you are saying with RPM, and i agree that high rpm for a small TT would cause alot of issues that you mensioned above with bearings and so on... if we say they are prooving a concept by just spinning a turbine, i would say its already been proved by tesla.. what i see as proove of concept is measuring power in and out and confirming efficiency that tesla claimed. And that i cant find. Even though my question was regarding the TT being able to run along side modern turbines , im actually interested in a smaller unit for my own use.. At this stage i can agree with your point that its not going to work on small scall, lets say 10kw farm use, but it would required a large turbine that produces way more than needed... and you would have to produce a huge amount of steam.. im looking for a 10 15 kw system that i can use on the farm and i dont think the TT would be great for that for reasons discussed above ... and thats sad... i like the idea... There is a guy named Jeremiah on YT used to be iEnergy, and i have followed his channel for a very long time... but he is not realy producing anything that excites me... what he is trying is to put the TT under vacume, so that water boils at lower temp end creates less drag on the TT as there is no air preasure... im not going to explain the whole process but you can check him out.. what frustrates me about him is , every attempt that he made to put load on a small TT failed, and everytime they claim how they can produce 3 4 KW with that small turbine at high RPM but never actually show any good results... so im a bit frustrated at the moment.
Tesla would be proud! You won't have to deal with the poor metallurgy that he had to deal with. He had issues with the blades stretching. I can't wait to see this on the output of the vapor compressor!
@@Unmannedair With the added diameter, it doesn't need to run at high rpm. Ideally will run at 3600 rpm because that is a standard rpm for an induction generator. The added diameter means it can handle high speed fluid input because the linear velocity at the tip will be dramatically higher than at the axle.
Not yet. The GP placed my toy projects on hold. I hope to make some more progress this summer. But funds are tight and playtime is limited for these extremely expensive hobbies.
It is important to note something here. In fact the spacing of the blades is important. But spacing has no effect on the actual boundary layer, which never changes, just the space in between the two surface faces that contain the boundary layer. Thus the nature of a boundary layer device.
@@ourhouseisfull11 Hello Don. I think I understand. I wonder if dividers between the plates would make sense? Something like this: imgur.com/gallery/p2KXvXn I've often wondered if boundary layers would develop more cleanly (more efficient?) if dividers were added to the case which separate each disk.
This is a thing of beauty, well done Mr Schmidtke! The added diameter should allow for very high linear velocity while reducing the rpm. Do you think this diameter is large enough to direct drive an induction motor at 1860rpm and get still get real power out of it? The small diameter turbines just spin too fast and need gearing or expensive permanent magnet DC motors.
In case you don't know what linear velocity is, here is a good explanation: www.khanacademy.org/science/physics/torque-angular-momentum/rotational-kinematics/v/relationship-between-angular-velocity-and-speed
Here's the long winded answer...The reason a high linear velocity is important with a tesla turbine ultimately has to do with the bearings. Consider that nozzle he is putting onto the edge of the disks at the beginning of the video. He's using air (i assume), but it could be super heated steam or even wet steam, the TT can handle both, bladed turbines cannot. To increase power at the nozzle you can increase the fluid's velocity, pressure and/or mass flow rate. Bladed turbines are designed to consume the power from the fluid by reducing the pressure of the fluid. Tesla turbines consume the power by reducing the velocity of the fluid. The fastest point the fluid is traveling is at the edge of the tesla turbine disk. As it spirals towards the center exhaust point, the energy is imparted onto the disks & axle. What will ultimately happen is the turbine will spin faster and faster until the edge of the disk is close to the linear velocity of the fluid coming in from the nozzle. Here's a simple equation: V = wr V = linear velocity w = angular velocity r = radius The angular velocity is ultimately how fast the axle is spinning. i.e. revolutions per minute. So if you have a high linear velocity and a low radius, then the angular velocity is going to be very high. This is a problem for bearings. Look up the cost of high speed bearings on mcmaster.com. You can find high speed bearings on mcmaster that can handle 140,000 rpm for an axle that is 0.1cm. But very small axles cannot handle huge amounts of input power. Look at the size of his axle. That sucker is huge! It's probably 7-8cm. Try to find bearings that have an inner diameter of 7-8 cm that can handle 140,000 rpm.... good luck. But... if you increase the radius of the disks, now you can handle the high linear velocity of the fluid and ultimately lower the angular velocity. This lowers the rpm down to a speed the bearings can handle. Make sense?
look up "Cold Jet Engine" It runs on compressed air only, Its using a axial compresser with a tesla turbine, could you try building one with this? thanks
I'm doing some calculations on the 15 blade, 60 inch , turbine, 3600 rpm. What do you think the estimated air/ steam supply would be in psi, lpm or cfm. Also does anyone know what sort of water supply, LPM etc to power this turbine if even possible. ?
Este video es muy inspirador. Si se cierra la cámara de alimentación de aire y se ponen 4 boquillas con venturi de aire, con el mismo flujo de aire, puede multiplicar por 10 el torque del eje y mover el PMG de 100 kW En China GREEFENERGY produce PMG de 100 kW A 3.000 RPM CON 400 N.M DE TORQUE, el cual puede conseguirse con esas mejoras en semejante "monstruo" de 60 pulgadas de diámetro. Felicitaciones
yes, but allowing free venting of steam to the atmosphere is extremely wasteful. Most of the power of steam is still present in the condensate, this must be captured and condensed to retain latent heat in the steam.
@@ourhouseisfull11 understood. I'm looking at creating a solar tube water heating system using steam for cooking, baking in a restaurant while some will drive the turbine for electricity generation
Also you need more blades to compensate for the outward force and make your input blades out of a good conductor of heat and your output a bad conductor of heat like steel with an insulator between the two. High efficiency.
I been watching tt. Tessyz long time.. This by far the biggest... Needa rent beg borrow.. Maybe 4 leroi IR garndenvr...to hum the puppy up.. Look like ssteel
24 cubic ft ×.50 air = 12 cuft &12 cuft blade 2019 lb 126lb pr disc cubic foot of iron would weigh 491 lb. A cubic foot of copper would weigh 559 lb. Silver is even denser than copper, at 655 lb for a cubic foot. Gold is really heavy at 1206 lb for a cubic foot
144 inch disks. I don't know how many you would need to develop 100kw but 4 should do it. Other factors like the volume of air and temp of combustion will be big factors.
@@ourhouseisfull11 7 times Better than nothing Thank you Mr.Don Schmidtke It is an honor to receive a reply a rebuke albeit So then what is the displacement ? And your air gap? RPM? And air consumption? This one thing is for sure This is the biggest tt on yt. I text to your fellow Michigander Fellow Tesla turbine builder Charlie Solis He does a 66 disc 10 inch diameter 10,000 sq in cluster I did a match up of the two.. yours and his.. In a comment The 16 disc 60 inch Has 90,432 sq in. Surface 60x60x .785 x 2 678 cubic inches 11,114 cc 11.1 ltr if Gap is .156 inch
@@aggabus Good morning Rayan I'm just doing some calculations on the 15 blade, 60 inch , turbine, 3600 rpm. What do you think the estimated air/ steam supply would be in l psi, lpm or cfm. Thank you in advance :) Also does anyone know what sort of water supply, LPM etc to power this turbine if even possible. ?
@@joshmitchell1976 my calculations are not very accurate off the cuff so to say.. have you seen the most excellent charlie solis .. or ienergy .. and that big disc is to big i guess.? would agree the air supply is much to small. it appears that little nozzle is feeding about(only) 4 of the 16 blades.. have you heard of the (old)tesla turbine builders club(or group i no remember) or seen the tesla turbine hybrid vid
This is just the rotor of the turbine. It will be placed in a casing and a C/D nozzle will be designed to run it when i have the time and funds to continue with my hobbies.
@@joelvoss1226 i see the escaping air aka exhaust as under or less or not enough.. but your perception is different and interesting.. would you care to expound a bit.. and thank you for this reply.
@@aggabus The required size of the exhaust ports of any engine (steam, gas, piston, turbine or even rocket) depends on the amount of fuel, type of fuel, amount & pressure of air and combustion temperature of gas. With steam it depends on the temperature, pressure, volume and the weight density (super heated dry steam will weigh less per cubic foot than saturated steam). I'll refer to gas/air and steam as "working fluid". The more the working fluid the more the power which results in more exhaust of the spent working fluid. Keep in mind as a working fluid enters the engine and combusts the pressure is highest at the point of ignition (with gas/air) or the point it enters the engine with steam. From that point the working fluid does nothing but do work, drop in pressure and cool in temperature. Tesla said he designed a 60 inch turbine with 15 disks that ran at 3600 rpm and produced 500hp. That does not mean Don plans on having this turbine output 500hp. That would be 373kw which is enough to power about 100 homes or more. But he may plan on running it at 100hp at 3600 rpm. If so, that would take a lot less working fluid and lower temps & pressure - both of which would *drop a lot* as they take that long spiral path around those 60 inch disks to the exhaust ports. And the exhaust ports would be designed *much smaller* than if that same turbine were putting out 500hp. Keep in mind that the exhaust ports you see on one side are doubled by the same size exhaust ports on the other side - duel exhausts. The reason to go with 60 inch disks is so it can be run at 3600 rpm and be directly coupled to a 2 pole generator to put out 60hz without reduction gearing. Also, the "tips" (outer edge) of 60 inch disks rotating at 3600 rpm will travel around 645 mph which is below the speed of sound (sub-sonic) so no shock waves are created in the engine which would cause all kinds of trouble. The large diameter disks allow complete usage of the working fluid at 3600rpm. Smaller diameter disks *need to operate at much higher rpm* so that the centrifugal forces force tighter (more) spirals around the smaller disks so that they travel a longer distance. Small remote control model airplanes have small turbines that run at 90,000 + rpm. The engines on the Boeing 727 engines run around 10,000 rpm. And now the fuel. If that turbine was to be used as a gas (diesel, gasoline, vegetable oil, kerosene, natural gas, etc) turbine the combustion chamber(s) would get to 900+ degrees F running at 500hp and that is without a turbo charger or supercharger. That would be a very hot, high pressure and high velocity working fluid that would need some large exhaust ports. But if you only wanted to run it at 250 hp or 150 hp the exhaust volume, temp and pressure would be much, much less and you would actually need smaller exhaust ports so as to have some back pressure at the exhaust. Some back pressure is needed so that the exhausted working fluid does not leave the combustion chamber too fast. If the turbine will use stream, like Don's other turbines, I would imagine to extract 500hp it would take super-heated dry steam. That means very high temperatures which means very high pressures which means a very dangerous boiler unless it is a sophisticated one with automated controls which means very expensive. Or, he could plan to pump a high volume of wet (saturated) steam into it at say 400 degrees F and have it put out much less horse power which would necessitate smaller exhaust ports. The difference between 900+ degree F combusted gas and 400 degree F steam pressure/temp/velocity at the exhaust ports would be significant. Here is a common example many know about. Take an Chevy 350 cubic inch engine. Back in the day they came with 145 - 390 hp stock. Modify that with a high performance cam which would open the intake and exhaust valves more, add a turbo charger or two, increase the size of the intake manifold, put on a larger carburetor and a higher flow fuel pump and you could have a 500hp engine without changing the displacement of the engine. But, you will have to enlarge the exhaust ports or that 500hp engine will choke itself.
@@joelvoss1226 Mr Joel Voss Iam honored for this reply. I need to study it.. I wish i could copy.. I would to reply.. I have another question but not yet. Must study this thy text.. Thank you.
The centrifugal forces on this at high speed will be immense, I hope we get to see where this is heading.
IM with you Green.... I think there is most certainly a limit in the diameter of these things as centrifugal force at hyper speeds is a real issue. Tesla Turbines eat and love speed. So unlike a diesel engine, slowing it down to deal with materials inability to handle forces isnt really an option. IM not even sure if there is any really benefit to larger diameters. Once you have reached a size where the incoming energy source transmits all its motion energy to the blades, bigger is just less efficient I would think. IM half talking out of my ass here and would like to hear what Don thinks about the "bigger diameter is better" idea and is there much to be gained (or anything) from larger diameters. ?? Final thought... If I was going to try and increase power of a TT, I would not expand diameter like that. I would expend blades horizontal along the shaft axis minimizing problems with centrifugal force exceeding the material tolerance while still increasing the surface area for increase energy input. Thats my two cents in the form of a question. Don, I am anxious to hear what you think. ....
@@timothyjones9430 Tesla stated he built a 500 hp, 60 inch, 15 disk turbine to run at 3600 rpm. At that RPM a 60 inch disk would have a tip speed around 645 miles per hour which is less than the speed of sound (sonic) and much less than hyper speed of around 3000 miles per hour. Small diameter Tesla turbines eat and love speed because they need that speed to form a tight spiral of the combustion gases. It is the tight spiral of the combustion gases that give the turbine the power, otherwise the gases would just take the shortest route from the inlet to the exhaust. With 60 inches of diameter the spirals would not need to be as tight or make as many "loops" around the turbine to travel the same distance around a smaller disk. And with a 60 inch disk with the gases making fewer loops would not cause power loss/waste because the gases would have already delivered the useful energy to the disks by the time it flowed out the exhaust.
When it comes to any engine, bigger is better or rather bigger is more efficient. The gas turbines that power model airplanes run at 90K+ rpm, a large engine on a Boeing 737 or 747 run around 10K rpm. The whole reason Tesla wanted a 3600 rpm turbine was to have it turn an ac generator which would output 60hz without reduction gearing.
@@joelvoss1226 I like your input here ... seems realistic , but do you think the Tesla is even capable of competing with modern turbines ... efficiency maybe , but what about power to weight... What is really discouraging it the fact that we see so many people start experimenting with this and just disappears .. So my logic is telling me that is not working out that well..
I love the TT, i want to build one too ... but i cant find anyone that has shown decent results .. Don is practical ,but production skills are lacking a bit , then you get people with amazing production skills but the mess around with 3d print the whole time ...
@@RJ_S_182 I'll take your points up one at a time.
1. Yes, the TT can compete with modern turbines *in some ways* but not in others. Where the TT does really well is *power to cost ratio* . Modern turbines not only use exotic metals but the grain (like the grain of wood) structure is highly engineered and the ceramic coating is space age technology. This allows the modern turbine to run at temperatures that would otherwise melt the metal. So with modern turbines you have sky-high temperatures which give sky-high pressure resulting in sky-high power output with low weight and the costs are also....sky-high. The modern turbines, like a jet engine, do have better power to weight ratio though.
2. Everything I said in #1 above is very important *only* when using a turbine for automobile, train and airplane transportation - power to weight ratio. But once the turbine is used for stationary power generation it does not matter if a modern turbine weighs 3X and the TT weighs 5X. By the way - a diesel with same power output will weigh around 25X. Even in marine transportation the weight is not much of a factor unless it is a very high-speed vessel.
3. You are correct when you say many people did experimenting and then nothing. You say your logic is telling you it is not working out well. Your logic is fine but it is missing data. 99% of those experimenters were only doing "proof of concept" meaning that they are simply showing that one can make a TT spin. Most never even put on any load and only a few of the ones that put on a load made any attempt to measure the load. The fact that most use compress air to "test" the TT shows that they were just playing around because they had no thermal activity going on. So it not that this did not go well, it's just that those experimenters accomplished when they set out to do. It comes down to intention - what do you intend to do with the TT you want to build? Do you want it to generate electricity? How much electricity? How often, a few hours a week, 5 days a week or non-stop? Do you want it to power a boat? What you want it to do will determine what you build.
4. I have not seen anyone on UA-cam build a working TT exactly the way Tesla said to build it. They take shortcuts, building it an "easier or "cheaper" way. Look at Tesla's patents. Look at the those detailed drawings and read the detailed writing he wrote in the patent. Look at the size of the bearings he had on his turbine shafts.
5. How do you plan to power your TT? Gas or steam? I doubt steam unless you have a boiler. A boiler to make steam for 1kw I guess one could do a homemade one. If you want 25KW you will need higher pressures which mean higher temperatures and more danger so will also require some controls. All that means a lot more $. You say Don's production skills are lacking. That is not really fair. Don has a business and he wants a way to burn stuff and not make a lot of pollution so he built a gasifier which burns materiel at high temperature and low oxygen which produces thick smoke which is then mixed with fresh air and burned again to produce a clean burning blue flame. He simply wanted to have a way to use that heat so, I suppose he experimented with different turbines as a way to use steam from the gasifier. But here is the problem, he is trying to use low pressure steam to turn a low RPM turbine to generate no more than 10kw. Those parameters are not very compatible. A 10kw TT is small so it needs to run at high RPM to be efficient - upwards of 25,000 RPM. To do that it needs a small amount of high pressure steam.
Don uses low pressure steam to run a turbine ( in one video of his largest TT) no more than around 6,500 RPM. That is very inefficient.
So why not run the TT at 25,000 RPM or faster? Here are a few reasons:
A: In the U.S.A a generator has to spin at 3600 RPM if it is a 2 pole generator or 1800 RPM if it is a 4 pole generator if it is going to *efficiently* output utility grade electricity. So how do you get a 25,000 or 35,000 RPM turbine to output 3600 RPM? You have to use a custom gearbox or at least an uncommon one which means they are not mass-produced and are therefore *expensive* .
B. So a turbine which outputs 10kw to a generator is small so it needs to run at very high RPM. That means special bearings each with its own oil supply which means an oil pump and a cooling radiator for the oil. Do you see that on Don's turbines? Nope. He uses greased-packed (low RPM) wheel bearings unless he
just greases the shaft, I can't tell which from the video. If he wanted to take any of his turbines up to 25,000 RPM those store-bought bearings would melt. Buying high-speed bearings of the size he needs are not mass-produced and while an oil pump can be cheap the one of the right size he needs would be a custom order and therefore *expensive* . Take a look at this video - this guy took his TT up to around 10,000RPM with regular greased wheel bearings (at best) and at that speed they did not even last 10 seconds. And he was using compressed air. ua-cam.com/video/yYy3-BZ7n1Y/v-deo.html
While you are looking at that video look at the way they guy designed the exhaust and the way he designed the intake nozzle! That is not even close to how Tesla said to build it.
C. So now Don has a 60 inch 15 disk TT. That will run at 3600 efficiently. But it is a big waste to only run a 10kw generator on it both in terms of cost of building the TT and that most of the energy would go to turning the TT even without a load. Put another way, it might take 4kw just it idle that TT.
6. Unless you already have a supply of steam or water (like from a boiler or waterfall or dam) you will want to use a gas TT. Tesla has a patent with detailed drawings for that as well. It won't need a boiler but the temperatures will be very high. You will need special metals like stainless steel and you may need to ceramic coat (NOT ceramic paint) the disks and the interior of the turbine casing depending on how much power you want to output.
So, if you just want a 5kw engine to power a generator in case of the power going out a TT is not worth it. If you want a 300-400 kw generator (500hp) to run most of the time then a TT can be worth it. Keep in mind a small high RPM TT used daily could cost several thousand dollars and you will have to design it and you will pay for any mistakes you make. Now you know why most of those experimenters did not take it further. It's not that it can't be done. It's just cheaper not to build one compared to just buying a generator set for camping or emergency temporary use at home. Buy the way, a $750.00 5kw emergency generator will not run at 80% power for 300 days - it would be scrap metal long before that. A gas powered $3,000.00 TT putting out 5kw could last a decade.
My best advice to you would be to study what Tesla wrote and was quoted as saying. Build it the way he said to build it. If that is beyond your skill level and finances then don't attempt it until your skills and finances are up to it.
@@joelvoss1226 Hi... geeze you went all out with your reply... thanks for your time..
So just to clarify, when i say Don's production skills, im referring to the vid quality... a cam hopping around, dark rooms etc where you cant really see anything.. just setting your cam up on a tripod would already assist and so on.. the production of his vid is basically holding a cam and talking , and i just wished he'd put a bit more effort into it. But anyway.
So to get to the turbine itself, i understand what Don is attempting with a large TT to get low RPM, and yes, that means high KW to make it work propperly and that makes 100% sense to me...
The thing with most of the youtube TT's is they are small, and yes i get what you are saying with RPM, and i agree that high rpm for a small TT would cause alot of issues that you mensioned above with bearings and so on... if we say they are prooving a concept by just spinning a turbine, i would say its already been proved by tesla.. what i see as proove of concept is measuring power in and out and confirming efficiency that tesla claimed. And that i cant find. Even though my question was regarding the TT being able to run along side modern turbines , im actually interested in a smaller unit for my own use..
At this stage i can agree with your point that its not going to work on small scall, lets say 10kw farm use, but it would required a large turbine that produces way more than needed... and you would have to produce a huge amount of steam.. im looking for a 10 15 kw system that i can use on the farm and i dont think the TT would be great for that for reasons discussed above ... and thats sad... i like the idea...
There is a guy named Jeremiah on YT used to be iEnergy, and i have followed his channel for a very long time... but he is not realy producing anything that excites me... what he is trying is to put the TT under vacume, so that water boils at lower temp end creates less drag on the TT as there is no air preasure... im not going to explain the whole process but you can check him out.. what frustrates me about him is , every attempt that he made to put load on a small TT failed, and everytime they claim how they can produce 3 4 KW with that small turbine at high RPM but never actually show any good results... so im a bit frustrated at the moment.
That's awesome! Exhaust holes on blades need to be larger.
No, not based on the input volume we expect to deliver. Exit velocity is 7.3 feet per second.
@@ourhouseisfull11 OK. Just curious, how many watts can
it produced?
@@iEnergySupply heh, small world. Didn't expect to see you here.
@@iEnergySupply Tesla said he was working on a 60 inch diameter, 15 disk turbine that would produce 500 horsepower.
@@ourhouseisfull11 I'm extremely curious about your work, I wish you could publish more. Did you stop or just stop publishing?
Tesla would be proud! You won't have to deal with the poor metallurgy that he had to deal with. He had issues with the blades stretching. I can't wait to see this on the output of the vapor compressor!
The blade stretching has little too do with poor metallurgy and more to do with the insain RPM these things rip.
@@Unmannedair With the added diameter, it doesn't need to run at high rpm. Ideally will run at 3600 rpm because that is a standard rpm for an induction generator. The added diameter means it can handle high speed fluid input because the linear velocity at the tip will be dramatically higher than at the axle.
Put it on a magnetic bearing with ferrofluid inside.
Nice!!! What a behemoth!
Is there more to this program...since this video?
Not yet. The GP placed my toy projects on hold. I hope to make some more progress this summer. But funds are tight and playtime is limited for these extremely expensive hobbies.
Any new vid of this one.
And the one on steam?
So cute is the outlet
WHat is the optimal blade spacing for efficiency ?
There are many variables, speed of fluid, density, etc etc. NICE BUILD !
It is important to note something here. In fact the spacing of the blades is important. But spacing has no effect on the actual boundary layer, which never changes, just the space in between the two surface faces that contain the boundary layer. Thus the nature of a boundary layer device.
@@ourhouseisfull11 Hello Don. I think I understand. I wonder if dividers between the plates would make sense? Something like this: imgur.com/gallery/p2KXvXn I've often wondered if boundary layers would develop more cleanly (more efficient?) if dividers were added to the case which separate each disk.
nozzle away wheel toward o.i. optical illusion ? no?
yes, every 60 hertz of rotational change will flip the appearance of this directional rotation.
@@ourhouseisfull11 thank you
What rpm. Are they tied at peralipheral like Jeff Hayes does
And balance 1500 lb rotor cluster
Yike.
This is a thing of beauty, well done Mr Schmidtke! The added diameter should allow for very high linear velocity while reducing the rpm. Do you think this diameter is large enough to direct drive an induction motor at 1860rpm and get still get real power out of it? The small diameter turbines just spin too fast and need gearing or expensive permanent magnet DC motors.
High linear velocity ??
Is your question what is linear velocity or why is a high linear velocity beneficial?
In case you don't know what linear velocity is, here is a good explanation: www.khanacademy.org/science/physics/torque-angular-momentum/rotational-kinematics/v/relationship-between-angular-velocity-and-speed
Here's the long winded answer...The reason a high linear velocity is important with a tesla turbine ultimately has to do with the bearings.
Consider that nozzle he is putting onto the edge of the disks at the beginning of the video. He's using air (i assume), but it could be super heated steam or even wet steam, the TT can handle both, bladed turbines cannot. To increase power at the nozzle you can increase the fluid's velocity, pressure and/or mass flow rate. Bladed turbines are designed to consume the power from the fluid by reducing the pressure of the fluid. Tesla turbines consume the power by reducing the velocity of the fluid.
The fastest point the fluid is traveling is at the edge of the tesla turbine disk. As it spirals towards the center exhaust point, the energy is imparted onto the disks & axle. What will ultimately happen is the turbine will spin faster and faster until the edge of the disk is close to the linear velocity of the fluid coming in from the nozzle. Here's a simple equation:
V = wr
V = linear velocity
w = angular velocity
r = radius
The angular velocity is ultimately how fast the axle is spinning. i.e. revolutions per minute. So if you have a high linear velocity and a low radius, then the angular velocity is going to be very high.
This is a problem for bearings. Look up the cost of high speed bearings on mcmaster.com. You can find high speed bearings on mcmaster that can handle 140,000 rpm for an axle that is 0.1cm. But very small axles cannot handle huge amounts of input power.
Look at the size of his axle. That sucker is huge! It's probably 7-8cm. Try to find bearings that have an inner diameter of 7-8 cm that can handle 140,000 rpm.... good luck.
But... if you increase the radius of the disks, now you can handle the high linear velocity of the fluid and ultimately lower the angular velocity. This lowers the rpm down to a speed the bearings can handle.
Make sense?
@@zenmanproject so 60in diameter disc is almost ideal for subsonic disc tip velocity at 3600rpm (or 60Hz) electric generator ;)
Tesla used a 60 inch 15 disk turbine @ 80 psi, and got 256.5 up . It would make a great power source!
256.5 what?
@@reeneeizzle I think he meant 'hp' horsepower.
look up "Cold Jet Engine" It runs on compressed air only, Its using a axial compresser with a tesla turbine, could you try building one with this? thanks
That's a big ass Tesla Turbine.
6.24 cu ft displacement
Ironic number.. .12 inch space. 1/8 inch ...i presuming ... Question is how many cfms to turn 1000 rpm..
Turn that unit on it side and levitate it with opposing magnets and see how long it spins.... :)
Is it possible to connect a 10 kw alternator and gearbox with it
Really???😱
What a beast!
I'm doing some calculations on the 15 blade, 60 inch , turbine, 3600 rpm. What do you think the estimated air/ steam supply would be in psi, lpm or cfm.
Also does anyone know what sort of water supply, LPM etc to power this turbine if even possible. ?
Este video es muy inspirador.
Si se cierra la cámara de alimentación de aire y se ponen 4 boquillas con venturi de aire, con el mismo flujo de aire, puede multiplicar por 10 el torque del eje y mover el PMG de 100 kW
En China GREEFENERGY produce PMG de 100 kW A 3.000 RPM CON 400 N.M DE TORQUE, el cual puede conseguirse con esas mejoras en semejante "monstruo" de 60 pulgadas de diámetro.
Felicitaciones
Could this work with wet steam from solar collectors?
yes, but allowing free venting of steam to the atmosphere is extremely wasteful. Most of the power of steam is still present in the condensate, this must be captured and condensed to retain latent heat in the steam.
@@ourhouseisfull11 understood. I'm looking at creating a solar tube water heating system using steam for cooking, baking in a restaurant while some will drive the turbine for electricity generation
Where are you from ? amazinggg .. but how can I make it work without an air compressor ?
michigan ?
HI, CAN YOU PLEASE SHARE THE DISC THICKNESS AND GAP BETWEEN DISCS
gap .4 mm disc 1mm
take tha 1.4 x the 16
= 22.4 mm 55/64 inch
but that array is more
so i wrong
the gap .4mm is the standard
Also you need more blades to compensate for the outward force and make your input blades out of a good conductor of heat and your output a bad conductor of heat like steel with an insulator between the two. High efficiency.
If that is the case, stainless steel would be a poor heat conductor.
DAMN!!! You mean business!!!
Holy hell, mate O.o
Cool.
Not taking a lot of force to rotate it just as a flywheel.
Don, What is your blade thickness and spacing on this rotor? Type of steel?
5600 cu in
93 lt 3.2 cu ft
12 x 455 cu in
6 x 15 lt
3.2 cu ft. x 8000rpm
25600 cu ft min
731 cu meter min
731k lt min
at 125 psi?
so what be rpm.
Imagine that with a housing and pump
Wouldn't that work better as a water wheel?
ah...... no. But we are just screwing around with it to see how off balance it was at that time.
@@ourhouseisfull11 What happens if you stagger the exhaust vents on each disk by about a 1/12 of an inch?
Keep it up
how it wheeling toward him while airing away..
optical illusion
Camera framerate illusion
Whoa!
60 rpm peripheral
600. axel( I forgot the???)
01:25.
Max 120rpm i think
hays version use rivet
2 inch from perif..
cut tuning forks.
helical
I been watching tt. Tessyz long time.. This by far the biggest...
Needa rent beg borrow..
Maybe 4 leroi
IR garndenvr...to hum the puppy up.. Look like ssteel
it gonna go with steam..like his others
I don't think AC current or AC induction motors are going anywhere too soon....
24 cubic ft ×.50 air
= 12 cuft &12 cuft blade
2019 lb 126lb pr disc
cubic foot of iron would weigh 491 lb. A cubic foot of copper would weigh 559 lb. Silver is even denser than copper, at 655 lb for a cubic foot. Gold is really heavy at 1206 lb for a cubic foot
Does anyone know where I can get dimensions for a turbine that needs to turn at 1500rpm and produces 100kw
144 inch disks. I don't know how many you would need to develop 100kw but 4 should do it. Other factors like the volume of air and temp of combustion will be big factors.
@@joelvoss1226 هل من الممكن اضافة الماء إلى الضاغط لنتمكن من تبريد الأقراص الدوارة . ولك مني الشكر على الإجابة
@@nasyrnasyr2914 I can only read English.
18 blade give you 3.6.9
785 cu in air
.45 cuft
12 liter steel
210 lb
95 kg
not even close, you are off by multiples of 7x. The rotor alone is 1500 pounds.
@@ourhouseisfull11 7 times
Better than nothing
Thank you Mr.Don Schmidtke
It is an honor to receive a reply
a rebuke albeit
So then what is the displacement ?
And your air gap? RPM?
And air consumption?
This one thing is for sure
This is the biggest tt on yt.
I text to your fellow Michigander
Fellow Tesla turbine builder
Charlie Solis
He does a 66 disc 10 inch diameter
10,000 sq in cluster
I did a match up of the two.. yours and his..
In a comment
The 16 disc 60 inch
Has 90,432 sq in.
Surface
60x60x .785 x 2
678 cubic inches 11,114 cc 11.1 ltr
if
Gap is .156 inch
Solis 10 in 66 disc
388 cu in
6365 cc 6.3 ltr
Started to say don Schmidt got the next biggest or had the biggest..which he did and does.. And this fellow look like don..
Shonuff
Need 2.8 cuft air..
Maybe per second
3.5 inch wide ÷ 16
7/32 per blade
X 56 = 11 3/4 wide.
56 blade
32in equal
2.8 cuft
Hit that wheel with sound... Frequency vibration..ultra ...
Air compression is so inefficient you need a steam compressor
@@nikola.tesla.r.and.d.centre This guy knows what he is talking about!
He has a large boiler.
Ok no ties.( Why say ties)
Nozzle to small.
Big air need
25 x heavier 2.7 x dia than 14 model
3600x .78 =2808 sq in. ÷ 144 = 19.5 sq ft
× 3.5 blade&space
68.5 cuft x 1/2
34 blade 34 air
30x30=900x4=3600
so 4x blade x 30 = 3.2 cu ft same
2 1/2 diameter
2/3 ft wide 24 blade/disc
600 rpm?
3600 rpm, tip speed around 645mph.
Biggest best newest
Oh look i see it 1400 lb..
In the heading... May had area or thickness or material or all wrong..
Good Afternoon Rayan I see you have all the answers I need to know. Would it possible to get your e email.
Thank you in advance
@@joshmitchell1976
all? ?
if you scroll a bit
look for the recent chat i had.. with one better than i .
@@joshmitchell1976
i now reviewing my
many comi .. yike some not good.. mr JM
look at Joel Voss reply to RayanAg
@@aggabus Good morning Rayan I'm just doing some calculations on the 15 blade, 60 inch , turbine, 3600 rpm. What do you think the estimated air/ steam supply would be in l psi, lpm or cfm.
Thank you in advance :)
Also does anyone know what sort of water supply, LPM etc to power this turbine if even possible. ?
@@joshmitchell1976
my calculations
are not very accurate
off the cuff so to say..
have you seen
the most excellent charlie solis .. or ienergy ..
and that big disc
is to big i guess.?
would agree the air supply is much to small. it appears
that little nozzle
is feeding about(only) 4 of the 16 blades..
have you heard of the (old)tesla turbine builders club(or group i no remember)
or seen the tesla turbine hybrid vid
Plenty of area to vibrate..that disc
312 sq ft of 1/8 thick steel 1591 lb..
60in
i say 2inch wide array divided by 16 is .12inch
(3mm)
inch (gap and blade)
no 1 / 8
Need much more air
32 42.5in diameter blade give same
Volume
60x60=3600in x .785
2827in÷ 144in
19.5 sqft x .29
5.6 cuft.
💪👍
2808×1.75
4914 cui
4914÷1728 cuft
4914÷1728×7.48gal cuft×22lb per gal alum
2.84375 cuft
467.9675 ttl
Not a tesla turbine. This is an impeller.
This is just the rotor of the turbine. It will be placed in a casing and a C/D nozzle will be designed to run it when i have the time and funds to continue with my hobbies.
why or how not a TesTur..
i see MrS still out there.
good.
@@ourhouseisfull11
thankyou Mr Schmidke
How is it not a Tesla turbine?! 😂
156 lb alu
450 lb copper
air bearing
Air bearing.. Like 500$
624 sq ft surface area.
6.24 cubic foot displacement
6.24 cu ft displacement
i say one inch air
b.L. between blade
that 2 year commi is error
1.92 thick steel ÷ 16 =
.12
that is 3 mm..
and another error mine.
Very much not enough air
bigger exhaust
Depends on how much power he wants it to make.
@@joelvoss1226
i see the escaping air
aka exhaust as under
or less or not enough..
but your perception
is different and interesting..
would you care to
expound a bit..
and thank you for this reply.
@@aggabus The required size of the exhaust ports of any engine (steam, gas, piston, turbine or even rocket) depends on the amount of fuel, type of fuel, amount & pressure of air and combustion temperature of gas. With steam it depends on the temperature, pressure, volume and the weight density (super heated dry steam will weigh less per cubic foot than saturated steam). I'll refer to gas/air and steam as "working fluid". The more the working fluid the more the power which results in more exhaust of the spent working fluid. Keep in mind as a working fluid enters the engine and combusts the pressure is highest at the point of ignition (with gas/air) or the point it enters the engine with steam. From that point the working fluid does nothing but do work, drop in pressure and cool in temperature.
Tesla said he designed a 60 inch turbine with 15 disks that ran at 3600 rpm and produced 500hp. That does not mean Don plans on having this turbine output 500hp. That would be 373kw which is enough to power about 100 homes or more. But he may plan on running it at 100hp at 3600 rpm. If so, that would take a lot less working fluid and lower temps & pressure - both of which would *drop a lot* as they take that long spiral path around those 60 inch disks to the exhaust ports. And the exhaust ports would be designed *much smaller* than if that same turbine were putting out 500hp.
Keep in mind that the exhaust ports you see on one side are doubled by the same size exhaust ports on the other side - duel exhausts.
The reason to go with 60 inch disks is so it can be run at 3600 rpm and be directly coupled to a 2 pole generator to put out 60hz without reduction gearing. Also, the "tips" (outer edge) of 60 inch disks rotating at 3600 rpm will travel around 645 mph which is below the speed of sound (sub-sonic) so no shock waves are created in the engine which would cause all kinds of trouble. The large diameter disks allow complete usage of the working fluid at 3600rpm. Smaller diameter disks *need to operate at much higher rpm* so that the centrifugal forces force tighter (more) spirals around the smaller disks so that they travel a longer distance. Small remote control model airplanes have small turbines that run at 90,000 + rpm. The engines on the Boeing 727 engines run around 10,000 rpm.
And now the fuel. If that turbine was to be used as a gas (diesel, gasoline, vegetable oil, kerosene, natural gas, etc) turbine the combustion chamber(s) would get to 900+ degrees F running at 500hp and that is without a turbo charger or supercharger. That would be a very hot, high pressure and high velocity working fluid that would need some large exhaust ports. But if you only wanted to run it at 250 hp or 150 hp the exhaust volume, temp and pressure would be much, much less and you would actually need smaller exhaust ports so as to have some back pressure at the exhaust. Some back pressure is needed so that the exhausted working fluid does not leave the combustion chamber too fast.
If the turbine will use stream, like Don's other turbines, I would imagine to extract 500hp it would take super-heated dry steam. That means very high temperatures which means very high pressures which means a very dangerous boiler unless it is a sophisticated one with automated controls which means very expensive. Or, he could plan to pump a high volume of wet (saturated) steam into it at say 400 degrees F and have it put out much less horse power which would necessitate smaller exhaust ports.
The difference between 900+ degree F combusted gas and 400 degree F steam pressure/temp/velocity at the exhaust ports would be significant.
Here is a common example many know about. Take an Chevy 350 cubic inch engine. Back in the day they came with 145 - 390 hp stock. Modify that with a high performance cam which would open the intake and exhaust valves more, add a turbo charger or two, increase the size of the intake manifold, put on a larger carburetor and a higher flow fuel pump and you could have a 500hp engine without changing the displacement of the engine. But, you will have to enlarge the exhaust ports or that 500hp engine will choke itself.
@@joelvoss1226
Mr Joel Voss
Iam honored for this reply.
I need to study it..
I wish i could copy..
I would to reply..
I have another question
but not yet. Must study this thy text.. Thank you.
Also the 586 sq ft of boundary layer surface could absorb more air
19.5 sq ft per disc x16 disc 312 sqft x .4mm 81,788 cubic mm
Need ten nozzle air supply
10x