I had a micro turbine almost 40 years ago, sourced from the Centre for Alternative Technology in Wales. There was nothing like the modern control and monitoring equipment available for the small scale, all it had was a simple transistor and resistor circuit mounted on a massive heat-sink intended to dissipate power as heat if there was danger of overcharging. It charged a high capacity 12V lead acid tractor battery and that powered 12V incandescent lamps - which were actually 21W car indicator bulbs that happened to have dual contact bases almost exactly like the SBC (small bayonet connector) used in many lamp fittings. Also occasionally a 12V TV. Really crude by today's standards but in an entirely off-grid house it allowed small luxuries like being able to go to the toilet or up to bed without carrying a candle. 😀
That's amazing thanks for sharing. Makes me grateful for how far we have come. Today I have a modern charge control with (more reliable) solar panels and agm batteries. Every product in my RV is designed for 12v usage except for my tv which runs on 19v. My lights take about 4 watts, 20 if I have them all on. The led tv only uses about 10 watts. I can't image something going wrong with the "controller", and having to physically solder new components on.
Very important your comment, in my oppinion, because I think we are already behind in what whe should have started to do decades ago...a city must be at least partially independente from the state in energy... peoplel like you should get together and try to more to join... The changes we have seeing in the last years show us that any "incidente"(even a minor one) can be a serious problem, the biggest the city is. I am from Brazil, but live in Europe half of my life. The times I came back, I tryed to bring some stuff like this and try to convince people...try a change of mind...seems impossible. We have "all" in Brazil. Except the will of the upper class, that make a huge effort to maintain the majority unneducated. Thanks for sharing.
I remember going to that Alternative Energy centre in Wales (Dolgellau if it's the one I went to). I found it really interesting what they were doing and that was about 30 years ago. It's a lot easier to source these things nowadays with T'internet and information resources such as this. Great idea of Andy's to make this sort of thing a hobby and not be hell bent on making (saving) money or even getting your money back. Even with the small quantities of energy you generate with these projects, you might be very grateful for it if power cuts kick in which I think is the most serious threat that we have had for about 50 years. Recent events in Ukraine make this much more likely. I believe solar PV cuts out if there is a power cut for safety reasons because you could be grid generating when someone was trying to repair the fault, but if you have a battery, you can still draw charge from that. If I was installing solar, I would definitely go with a battery even though it might double the cost.
As a wind turbine testing engineer I would like to offer a couple comments: 1: Not sure if I would use the 4x4 or whatever wooden pole you were using as the base with 500 W of power that can produce a lot of bending force on that wood. It might be fine with the size you have, but if you look into the foundations required for other small wind turbines you might be under sized and over time it might break. 2: I would NEVER have a turbine that close to my house especially one with such little control no pitch no over speed (it is a stall controlled turbine I am guessing, but from china never really sure of their safety systems). It is very small so you might be ok from a safety stand point, but you will always have a lot of turbulence and lower wind speeds. 3: The power cable you are using for they turbine scares me. It is not a 3 phase cable, which means it looks like you were using a ground wire as one of the phases. I understand that the ground wire is probably the same thing electrically, but we have a color code fore a reason so that other people understand what is hot and what is not. 4: I would always ground the metal surface of the turbine. with no ground and the metal pole not extending to the ground if lightening strikes your whole fence may start on fire. typically turbines have huge grounding strips everywhere to connect to the tower which is then grounded by the re-bar in the foundation. 5: it looks like the output of your 24v inverter you have connected to your turbine is connected to you charge controller using maybe 16 gauge wire (1.291 mm not sure how you measure wire over there). If you have all 500w coming from your turbine converted to 24V that would be 20.833 A, which is much higher that what can safely be transmitted by 16 guage wire. Edit: Oh and 6: rather than increasing the number of blades you have try increasing the length slightly. I think (based on my calculations and experience) you will be dissapinted by the decrease in rated wind speed (producing full power at lower wind) by adding blades. For an example from commercial turbines: a 90m diameter turbine is typically around 1.5 MW (1500 kW) where as a 116m can be almost 3 MW. Just make sure you get blades that are stall controlled if there are no overspeed safety systems on the turbine.
@@jacorin the issue with wind turbines on sailing boats ( or any moving object for that matter) is they create a considerable amount of force parallel to the direction of the wind. This makes capturing energy on anything not firmly anchored in place basically impossible.
The best thing you can do to increase the efficiency of the turbine is to get it away from the house AND increase the pole height. Turbines need unobstructed, non-turbulent air flow. If the box says 4.5-meters, that is 4.5-meters above the house peak.
@@patfranks785 coastal residence could benefit using this mini wind turbine, as the winds might frequently passing by their area at a certain height, say like 15 meters above the surface
A few years ago I built a 10 foot wind turbine from scratch using a Hugh Piggott design and mounted it 30 feet up. On a good day it gave 1.2kw peak. It was good fun and I learned a lot but the most important thing I learned was my area isn't windy enough for a wind turbine. Most inland areas are the same unless on a high hill.
The high plains in the u.s. in Nevada are very windy and very far inland but I think it's very sporadic And today it's annoying the hell out of me because it's no good to be outside
I always think a great item to prioritize for these systems is your fridge. Just bring a power lead from the battery storage out to the fridge. When I was in Spain, by just putting my fridge on a timer (so it only came on about 1 hr in 3), I was able to half my electric bill. Because a typical fridge is on 24/7 and runs at 90-130 Watts.
If you are gonna use an mppt controller, you should consider placing a few very big capacitors on the dc side of your rectifier. To stabilize the voltage.
@@nekelly123 No, the voltage needs to be stabalized into the DC input of the MPPT controller, otherwise the MPPT algorithm will be confused by the 120Hz voltage changes (from 60Hz full-wave rectified). The battery voltages should be very stable on their own.
Change your drain plug on your hot water tank if you have one. For a element and dump power to heating water. That way you save on gas or oil. Depending on how your water is heated.
As a turbine and structural engineer of 48 years! I can tell you do not listen to these wannabes below, they know nothing. That wood will support that turbine fine.
Thanks for your input. I really wasn't sure. I working load measurement (model validation), and dont design the towers. I jusybknow how many forces there are, and was not sure about the strength of wood. I still stand by what I said about grounding with the wood. Also not trying to be a troll, but was actually trying to provide valuable feedback.
Good show Andy. As you all saw on the 6+ videos on my channel, Mines been up almost 18 months now, not one issue, and always as long as its installed right makes over its rating.
I bought a Chinese 800w it worked for a month or 2 then I noticed it spinning uncontrollably I changed out the controller but somethings not right, being a permanent magnet type could something be burned out in the generator itself? I have tried a few controllers, there is open voltage when generator is spinning its a 012-24v controller on a 24v. GENERATOR I also have 24v. controllers I've tried
It was a year or two but believe it or not it was just after watching one of your videos and got the link off you I believe I ordered thru albi or Ali something like that I'm getting open circuit voltage from the 3 generator output wires but it doesn't top off battery and brake the generator anymore for some reason also it spins crazy fast in heavy wind seems like circuitry in generator to me because I have several controllers, it worked perfectly new. Oh the company in China was green something I think, thanks for answering
@@johnpower8356 Use a standard rectifier 3 to 2 configuration 100 amp straight through to battery. If you not getting effect then it's time to check backwards up the drop cable to the Turbine. And possibly the slip ring assembly. If your turbine has been throwing its brakes a whole lot the whole time you've owned it you may have caused a high carbon buildup on your slip rings inside the turbine housing. Or you could have caused some type of corrosion on your connections below the turbine. That's the angle I would look.
The 24 Volt turbine charge controller will not work correctly without a 24 Volt battery connected to it, the Victron is expecting a solar panel which can be loaded down to it's MPTT voltage of about 17 Volts for a 12 Volt system, the turbine controller is most likely in a protection mode at 17 Volts. Don't connect a battery directly to the input of your Victron either, it will over current itself and burn out, it's expecting high source impedance from the solar panel giving that characteristic knee curve you see on panel performance data.
It might be the turbine controller since it's designed at 24v, it might not output anything if the turbine is below that. Try eliminating it and using your bridge rectifier directly to the solar charger.
Not a good idea to use a solar charge controller on a wind turbine. After reaching highest voltage limit, normally it disconnects the wind turbine's input and the turbine runs without load with the risk of overspeeding. I would recommend a 12V wind charge controller for 500W turbines.
@@simfungreek I don't quite get how these turbines could overspeed... what would happen to it? it has bearings right? why can't it just spin fast if it wants to
More turbine content please Andy. Just bought a solar setup and storage batteries and now want to look into turbines for cloudy bad weather days. Cheers
I’m currently sat in my campervan in the middle of nowhere 1hr north of Inverness lambing. It’s howling here. This would save me spinning the generator up on the shed for power when the lambs are born. 👍🏻
The quick answer to the title's question in the form of more questions: 1) does the turbine, in its operational lifetime, generated considerably more energy than it took to manufacture it and all the ancillary components to make it function ... assuming a comprehensive and accurate measure of manufacturing energy expended, and 2) does the consumer actually use a sizable fraction of the energy that could be generated by the turbine?
@@cougar1861 how would you calculate - 1? We factoring in the energy required for the paint. To produce every individual bolt? If we want an true value yes we would. But ain't no one calculating that... The cost of energy required to do any of those things would fluctuate constantly... Would depend on when and where the individual components were produced. Just calculate the cost of the kit in full when you bought it and go from there. We're not manufacturing these things for profit, that's the job of the person who built the stuff to calculate that shit. And he will have factored all that into his costing for final rrp (hell be wanting a profit obviously) so if you spent 3 grand on it all, it cost less than 3 grands worth of power to produce, that's a given. Unless your buying second hand, then it just gets complicated again... Basically just go off what you paid and not worry about the rest
@@1invag I'm not picking on you/your product. I've made the same comment at every, of the many, chance I get. And I'm not talking about money "value." At this stage of imminent climate crisis, $$$ accounting has to give way to energy accounting because CO2 emission is the unavoidable consequence of fossil fuel use. Thus the appearance of alternative energy products as this wind turbine. It's a general, very important issue: if an alternative energy "solution" requires more energy (i.e. CO2 emission) to produce than the projected "CO2-free energy" it will deliver in it's useful lifetime, then there is no reason for it to exist --- IF the overall purpose is to address the issue of climate crisis. if you are "not manufacturing these things for profit," then what IS the reason for manufacturing them, if not to provide a valid alternate energy source, as above?
How about putting a capacitor in between to power the meter and have some more constant loading. Specially if you wanna feed it to your house. A constant, smooth supply without peaks is always better, there some pre finished models to replace a car battery which I assume to be a good solution
Really makes me appreciate how drama-free and relatively easy solar is. Was considering diversifying the renewable power for my off-grid bus but wind seems impractical for my purposes. Thanks for the video!
Solar is wildly expensive I know assholes that try to charge $50,000 to rig up an entire house, wind on the other hand just requires electric motors and mechanical energy very primitive and cheap by comparison. The big disadvantage of wind energy though is that you have to actually be good at physics you can't just guess. Where as installing solar panels is a mindless task similar to installing shingles. If you're smart, but poor wind is an excellent option. If you're rich and dumb go with solar.
I was warned about just running my dump circuit to a grid tie. It's good until there is a power disruption from the utility so, there has to be some backup. I'll keep watching you for inspirational ways to get around that issue. Nice setup.
Why dont you setup the dump circuit to enable a electronic brake for the turbine when the voltage drops the solenoid disables the brake and allows the turbine to spin again?
An electric water heater can be a dump with benefits (at least until it reaches temperature!) but a big resistance dump is probably best unless you can afford to take the risk of the blades or bearings failing)
So ideally you want to harness the wind power so you have plenty of excess and somewhere to dump the excess you don't need, maybe an extra turbine if needed, automated so that it dumps power somewhere useful when your batteries are full.
I would get a big fan plugged into an extension cord and mount on the pole next to the wind turbine. When there is no wind ,I would just turn the fan on to make it turn.
When you get 8ms it will shock you in output. But please increase your wire size if its under 8awg in that length of run. And guy wire it, plus ad 3 meters higher.
Your on to it, saved me posting. Thanks. I also wondered if the MPPT on the charge controller was quick enough to react on days when it is not a constant wind.
Gutted I got a 12v one, next to useless with the wind we have here in Surrey. Run my man cave from 6 100w panels, 4 x 110ah leisure batteries on a 12v system with 3.5kw inverter. I get 4 hours of 3 double strip lights, drill chargers, gadgets n gizmos. Just about self sustaining with 2-3 in the cave sessions a week if there’s a bit of sunshine about. This Easter weekend I’m off, sun is forecast it should be whopping the amps in with a lot of cave time. I bought the turbine the same time as the panels. I’m hoping it will be the top up in the winter months when there is less sunshine and less cave time. However like yourself I have been monitoring it when it’s having a whizz and it ain’t much cop. That charger you have is the same as mine, just different voltage apparently it has a brake for the turbine (that’s from Chinese supplier) to stop overcharging and turbine over speed so probably uses a fet to short the windings. I went and got a Victron 150/35 pv, BMV 702 and the Venus network interface to replace the Renogy rover 40. And mad coincidence I got the bridge rectifier too. I’m going to cut out the the standard controller, fit the bridge rec and fire it into the Renogy box. I don’t hold out much hope as it’s a 12v turbine but like you say toyz to play with. I reckon my system should pay for itself about 3 years after I’m dead 😂 enjoy your vids keep em coming.
I had six 100 watt panels but in July I added four more ; when I did my amps doubled...I have six 110 AH batteries and eight 90 AH ones...I bought the smaller ones at first so I could save up for an Aims Power 2000 watts inverter / charger 24 volts...I used a 40 amp Epever controller...so far , every time I think about a wind generator I wind up getting two more solar panels
Had a 12 volt Missouri turbine since 2017 and just a car battery,and not connected to the grid.No problems so far,soon will connect sun panels too and buy lifepo battery,also changed to led strips light both color and just white.Also have 24 and 48 volt wind gens of which the 24 volt will be installed outside the barn for led strips and charging electic forklifter.Thank you.
Before we even mention 'dump loads', does that wind gen self regulate in high winds? If it does, then my experience thus far (with similar products) is that it will burn out during the first storm (prolonged high winds) you get. You need to fit a dump load circuit for any decent wind gen and FULL MARKS for recovering that power! But my experience thus far with high performance wind gens that are manufactured using chinesium is that they will burn out......they cannot handle the sustained generation of power in high winds, EVEN with dump loads. The dump load protects the battery bank from 'over-volts', it DOES NOT stop the wind gen from turning and producing power; I've seen (marine rated/claimed) gens go into 'brake mode' in high winds...I've seen them burned out a few weeks later...............more than once, twice, trice..... I have also witnessed a 150w rated wind gen, of comparable size, with a dump load (MorningStar?) on a deserted, windblown islet in the Shetlands, perform for years and survive serious storms...wish I could remember the manufacturer, I believe German, but salutary lesson, don't believe all the claims for a product and don't go for the highest claimed power, sometimes you have to pay for the good stuff. I wish you luck,
Those crappy little controllers just short the windings to break them. How ever this one won't as it's not connected to the battery. But the MPPT controller with a totally unsuitable algorithm on it.
The victron is telling you the amount of power that HAS been stored into the battery the the rc meter is telling you the power production the difference is charging losses. With mppt solar best if input voltage is 1.5-3x battery voltage with wind you want to get as close to the max input as you can. You need a pwm charger with a buck-boost support. Also look into ideal diodes using half-bridge mosfet you can save a lot of power and add braking functionality. I made cust firmware for a 100A opto hobby esc turning it into a ideal diode and buck boost charger by using a feedback.
I would consider what the output from the three phase Controller is, if the victron input is the MPPT type, it needs more than 12v-18v to utilize the power coming in from the wind or solar, so basically, if the three phase Controller is output isn't outputting the 24v that the mppt controller needs to work at it's best, then you might need to get rid of the controller that came with the turbine and Go directly from the rectifier to the victron.. hope this helps 🙂
I bought the 600 watts version of the same thing. Looks just like the one you have. I also ordered the 24 volts model. They sent me the same controller you have there. It didn't work out because they sent me a 12 volts model turbine. So I ordered a 200 amps rectifier and hooked it up with some cables I got with a cheap inverter that had some big alligator clips on them. So I have twenty marine batteries, it has to charge one side of ten, or the other. I just switch it around. From what I can tell it's putting about 140 watts into the batteries with a good wind. It doesn't put out enough to need a dump load. It can't overcharge the battery bank. I bought two more 100 watts solar panels, so I have 1400 watts of those things now. I think the problem with both of our turbines is the same ; I believe they must be wound with aluminum wire. I ordered a 24 volts model, but this one puts out 18-21 volts a lot of the time. It's windy enough here for a turbine most of the time. There are two short videos, just a few seconds long, of it spinning on my channel. That is the only thing I can think of that would make the voltage be so low. I'm going to have to fix it or get another one, I guess. I don't know whether to use it as is, and buy a different one, or try to rewind it with copper and possibly destroy it, and buy another. I have a theory that in order to get 24 volts out of one of these things, you have to get the 48 volts one, so they have to use copper to get that much voltage. I'm not sure but I think that's what the deal is. They don't tell you that in the advertisement. And I would bet that the 48 volts version costs a lot more. I doubt if you can buy just the stator, but I don't know that. I agree, solar is easiest. Just aim those panels and go. March average wind speed here is 10.2. There's a cold front coming down out of Colorado, so I'll get wind all night now. When I got mine, the crush plate holes were for a different one, maybe an 800 watts. I had to slot them and then use washers, so I had to go get longer bolts. I got higher grade bolts than they sent. I have room for nuts on the back of six of them. I used a fender washer on the outside three but had to grind part of them off so the nose cone would go on. I've had it up for six days. It's been windy for about four of those. After I get a different one put up and working, I will have to take this one apart and see why there is aluminum wire coming off the slip rings. Maybe the stator is copper, just 12 v. I don't know. It's not really good enough like it is, unless it's pretty windy every day. I'm using mine, but it's kind of a Gilligan's Island set up, I have to switch it from one set of ten batteries to the other side. If I hooked it up 24 volts, the prairie wind might tear it apart. So having it 12 v, it doesn't turn fast as it would 24, I guess. I'm getting some high wind now. There's a front coming down. Sounds like it's around 45 MPH wind. The only other thing I can think of, there's an electric motor rebuilders place here, I could get copper wire put in it there, but jeez they charge a lot. But no bigger than this little guy is, it might not cost too much. So if I try to rewire it, and can't do it, that's the last option. But if they do it, it'll make 50 volts probably. If I can get some copper wire in it, and get some voltage out if it, I'll buy a good charge controller for it. I have a DC motor that makes 79 volts that I may put some blades on, as well. It should make 350 watts or so, it's a half horse. I wrapped a cord around the 3 inch pulley and pulled it made 79 volts three times in a row. I can make a wind generator out of it. Just curious if you have thought about rewind it for a different voltage. I'm thinking about finding some 15% silver wire, get it rewound with it, and send them a picture of it. I don't know why they can't get their heads out of their asses and build some decent wind generators. I had to turn the hotplate on, the wind is howling, voltage spiking to 29.3 The darn thing works, just half way. With these 50 MPH gusts, I could probably hook it up 24 volts. Crazy stuff. I guess it's like buying an inverter, you have to get a junky one or two before you figure out how to get a better one. Maybe the 500 watts rating is during a small tornado. If it was copper wire wound it will probably make 510 watts. But then they wind it with aluminum wire and it never makes the rating. They just don't put that in the advertisement
I started with a Rutland mounted on a pole on the shed, but it suffered from too much turbulance and didn't do a lot even in a hurricane. I then fitted an airbreeze on the side of the house. When it really ripped, The noise in the house sounded like a Chinook was landing on the roof. I tried to video the noise indoors but the sound never came out properly. In 4 years I dont think it paid for itself. I took it down when I built my extension, but I wouldn't mind a bigger one on a mast. Just need to get it high enough above the rooftops to get over the turbulance.
I always get a 50 watt loss from the Victron to my batteries. Dump load into a water heater element, in your water heater, free heat saves natrual gas.
You didn't mention price that I remember. I like seeing these new energy sources. Now a big fan as of yet. My uncle bought 6 for $100,000 and they were junk in a year. I think there was some contentious conversation between his employee and the installation person, he removed the brakes.
I would like four of these, in every corner in our house to the top of maybe flag pole:) maybe high velosity power train to cellar where generator could be, common of quartet😀
Did some quick math on his 60 watts over 2.5 hrs: at $.12/kWh retail here in Indiana (US), it would be on track to save roughly $25/year. If he only spent $1k on the total array (including time), a bank CD earning 2.5% would be equivalent (unless factors changed of course).
40 Year to break-even !!! ( = $1,000 / $25 per year ). It will fail before it ever earns the $1,000 original investment . So it earns *NOTHING* . It is a toy...
If you had a storage area to collect water up high in a hill then there would be no need for battery controllers etc and the turbines could run pumps directly mechanically then tat would be the best system and when power is required the water would run down hill under gravity flow to run a big generator when required.
You are in Great Britain that have about 30% of Europe's wind,I thought that your wind Turbine should generate more than it's rated out put. I am dissatisfied by the numbers that it is outputting. Regardless any Renewables are better. Small scale Solar PV is better Thanks for the video!
Good video Andy - I love wind turbines, but I think this particular one isn't worth it because it's far too small to be useful, and little more than a toy. Still, it's fun to play with! With blade lengths of a couple of metres or more, then you're looking at multiple kW, but also planning issues with the council. Only really suitable for rural areas and rich landowners really.
Depends on your purpose, not everybody's installing renewables to "run the house" or "pay for itself". Anything you can generate at home takes load off the grid, and the solar generator revolution is just getting started. My little Anker only puts out 300 watts, it doesn't need charging with 5000!
~~~~~~ SOLAR BY DAY, WIND BY NIGHT 😊~~~~~~ This would be perfect for all those cold windy nights in Canada. You cant charge at night with solar but with wind you could still charge when the sun goes down or while you sleep.
i was thinking the cyclone vortex would create a back vacuum suck vortex at the rear of the blades like when you whistle the sound must come from pressurised vibrational friction/air cause
@Andy Kirby the discrepancy is most likely due to the fact that your using a mppt - which senses a while and adjusts on load change. theese are not particulairly great for such fluctuating loads. use a pwm fed by the rectifier from the wind turbine in parallel to the mppt from pv & batteries instead to not loose that power (Wind ->Rect->fuse->pwm->fuse->batt). btw. loving what you do - i am pretty similar minded haha from europe - germany. actually want to get a twizzy sometime ( loved what you did with it ). Kind of want to do the same - tires + twizzy box for commuting :)
Wind turbines are all about position and height. Took us ages to get the sweet spot. Then of course in winter to windy can be a problem. More erratic production but wind can be 24hrs not just daylight. Most benefit in short winter days then solar better in longer summer days.
If your allowed you should put it higher and it will work better even in low winds.i used to have mine as high as yours worked alright b.ut now it's on top of my roof and works so much so much better
Andy, get 24 volts worth of SLA batteries, about 80ah to use to run the turbines 24v power into, from them send into a LiPo controller for your lithium bank. Looks like your kicking it nice. Its called slave batteries. In my 11 years of installing wind turbines I usually put 48 volt turbine, to charge Lithium.
Electrically heated in floor coils can absorb a lot of off grid electricity. Insulated thermal mass concrete and tile floors could be heated with the windy winter. Is it windy in your winter season?
mate, you will absolutely find you wasted your money. i found a solar panel makes about 400 times more money for the same money. but hei, everybody is entitled to make their own experiences.
True but this will work at night as well. I came to the same conclusion as you when I figured out I'd need about 40km/h winds to do anything useful with.
Like he said, don’t get one to save money. A hybrid system will give a better average power output over the year than a single resource system. The problem lies in the position of the turbine, and average wind speed at your location. The potential output of a turbine increases with the rotor diameter squared, but also with the wind speed cubed. The turbine needs to be 10m above all closest obstructions to ensure laminar flow over the blades.
The most efficient has one blade but balance is an issue. Two blades get interference vibration at 2x per rev. Three blades is a good compromise. 5 blades will make it turn slower.
one blade is perfect, but you do a vertical instead of horizontal blade. it works no matter where the wind comes from but you will have slight obstructions from the stuff that holds the top of the blade so it isn't only connected at the bottom, but they are VERY efficient and spins from wind from any direction, even turbulent one
I lived aboard in a marina for years. Another boater had a wind turbine that made a bothersome sound while in operation. Such a device might be good if you live in the country, but not in close quarters.
I put a wind charger up in 2002. Only had lead acid batteries really back then. I remember it took a few days to start up I think the bearings just need to free up a little. Thing to remember is solar only produces in the day and optimal in the summer when wind is 24/7 and best in winter :) it’s a good combo. One night in a storm mine was going crazy off the scale on power.
Don't sweat it yet. Come winter time, when the sun is low in the sky and the days are short, there's a real good chance, that wind turbine does the "heavy lifting". You may have simply picked the wrong season, to get the good capacity factor out of the turbine.
since you are running this into a MPPT, you really should have gone for the 48v model. this way you would be more likely to have a voltage higher than your min MPPT voltage. If this doesn't make sense, hit me back and I will explain.
I bought a similar turbine on eBay five blade 12 V found it was only ever good in really windy days!! Like it had to be making the swooshing noise for it to make power at all, just spinning quickly wasn't enough. But when that thing was spinning it was chucking 4-5 Amps at 12 V at least into my power bank. Living in the UK it's quite a good feeling after few days of overcast (Little solar) and then have storm blow through and wake up to a fully charged battery bank bliss. My off grid home is in the valley with a persistent Direction of wind but getting the turbine high as possible is key.
My local council in Australia need Development approval for wind turbines in residential areas. We also need insurance in case the turbine comes flying off and kills someone.
Its good law but insane for you , anyway don,t worry wind turbines not pay of its waste of money most people forgot to take in account inflation and life spam is to short .
Those little meter are handy things. I need a few more here. I'm going to use a Plug N Play Grid tie for a Dump Load. Every bit off the bill helps. Here in the desert South West of New Mexico our winds are way more productive.
Thanks! My solar panel break even point is 1 year with current kWh price of roughly 0.90 EUR instead of the usual 0.22 EUR. Thing are crazy here so looking for solutions to get more self sufficient. Wind power is not near as reliability and power production as solar but all small amounts help. We have black-outs as well due to overload on the power grid. AC jumped from ~220V to sometimes 250V which can be harmful to some electronics.
Since everyone puts in their .02cents. The longer the wire is the more resistance in the system at low voltage. I’m thinking it would be more efficient to have the batteries charge controller and inverter very close to the windmill and to have 220v sent from there since 220v does same amount of work with half the energy and can travel longer distances on the copper wire. Of course gold wires would be the ultimate medium to transport energy. I’m thinking about how the Egyptian pyramids may have been a huge hydro battery system. The caps were apparently made of gold. Also to control the speed of the windmill it would extract further upward or downward as a governor in higher wind conditions so as not to over spin.
The reason your Victron is showing less peak power than your monitor is because the Victrons MPPT can't keep up with the constantly changing peaks and troughs of the generator output. A large reservoir capacitor directly across your Chinese charge controller output would improve this.
I hear vertical turbines are supposed to be better near houses, they do better with turbulent wind, which is common in built up areas. Horizontal turbines like this are better much higher up however.
*All practical tests show that small wind turbines hardly generate any electricity! And only at very high costs!* Because there is hardly any wind close to the ground. It is also extremely gusty, which usually shortens the service life. Only if you need to be self-sufficient from the power grid, you should have the largest possible wind turbine for the winter on a high mast. *With solar modules, on the other hand, you can reliably generate green electricity for 25 years at approx. 3-10 cent/kWh!*
People always ask alot of renewable energy in your home vs cost - you need to remember your fighting against billions of dollars worth of infrastructure regarding power. if that was yet to be put in place, these items would be absolutely world changing.
Yeah you are right. I think The infrastructure is setup to make excess energy so that it can be wasted actually, and that’s what most of us do. When you start creating your own energy it changes your mind set towards how you use it which is ironic really as we should have done that before going to the trouble of making our own energy!
Solar hydrogen needs no high voltage but high current for low temperature electrolysis. Perhaps high speed small rotor generators are perfect for that.
that's what i've done to my one of these which also never generates high enough output voltage to even start charging a 12V battery without a buck boost converter
Someone else mentioned that a wind turbine can keep your batteries warm over night. One pkace that a wind turbine would work really well would be near the coast. There is normally a wind generated there.
I had a micro turbine almost 40 years ago, sourced from the Centre for Alternative Technology in Wales. There was nothing like the modern control and monitoring equipment available for the small scale, all it had was a simple transistor and resistor circuit mounted on a massive heat-sink intended to dissipate power as heat if there was danger of overcharging. It charged a high capacity 12V lead acid tractor battery and that powered 12V incandescent lamps - which were actually 21W car indicator bulbs that happened to have dual contact bases almost exactly like the SBC (small bayonet connector) used in many lamp fittings. Also occasionally a 12V TV.
Really crude by today's standards but in an entirely off-grid house it allowed small luxuries like being able to go to the toilet or up to bed without carrying a candle. 😀
That's amazing thanks for sharing. Makes me grateful for how far we have come. Today I have a modern charge control with (more reliable) solar panels and agm batteries. Every product in my RV is designed for 12v usage except for my tv which runs on 19v. My lights take about 4 watts, 20 if I have them all on. The led tv only uses about 10 watts.
I can't image something going wrong with the "controller", and having to physically solder new components on.
Very important your comment, in my oppinion, because I think we are already behind in what whe should have started to do decades ago...a city must be at least partially independente from the state in energy... peoplel like you should get together and try to more to join...
The changes we have seeing in the last years show us that any "incidente"(even a minor one) can be a serious problem, the biggest the city is. I am from Brazil, but live in Europe half of my life. The times I came back, I tryed to bring some stuff like this and try to convince people...try a change of mind...seems impossible. We have "all" in Brazil. Except the will of the upper class, that make a huge effort to maintain the majority unneducated.
Thanks for sharing.
I remember going to that Alternative Energy centre in Wales (Dolgellau if it's the one I went to). I found it really interesting what they were doing and that was about 30 years ago. It's a lot easier to source these things nowadays with T'internet and information resources such as this. Great idea of Andy's to make this sort of thing a hobby and not be hell bent on making (saving) money or even getting your money back. Even with the small quantities of energy you generate with these projects, you might be very grateful for it if power cuts kick in which I think is the most serious threat that we have had for about 50 years. Recent events in Ukraine make this much more likely. I believe solar PV cuts out if there is a power cut for safety reasons because you could be grid generating when someone was trying to repair the fault, but if you have a battery, you can still draw charge from that. If I was installing solar, I would definitely go with a battery even though it might double the cost.
Were i live you wouldnt have to care about that at all as having a windturbine is a crime.
@@mikaellindqvist5599 Where?
As a wind turbine testing engineer I would like to offer a couple comments:
1: Not sure if I would use the 4x4 or whatever wooden pole you were using as the base with 500 W of power that can produce a lot of bending force on that wood. It might be fine with the size you have, but if you look into the foundations required for other small wind turbines you might be under sized and over time it might break.
2: I would NEVER have a turbine that close to my house especially one with such little control no pitch no over speed (it is a stall controlled turbine I am guessing, but from china never really sure of their safety systems). It is very small so you might be ok from a safety stand point, but you will always have a lot of turbulence and lower wind speeds.
3: The power cable you are using for they turbine scares me. It is not a 3 phase cable, which means it looks like you were using a ground wire as one of the phases. I understand that the ground wire is probably the same thing electrically, but we have a color code fore a reason so that other people understand what is hot and what is not.
4: I would always ground the metal surface of the turbine. with no ground and the metal pole not extending to the ground if lightening strikes your whole fence may start on fire. typically turbines have huge grounding strips everywhere to connect to the tower which is then grounded by the re-bar in the foundation.
5: it looks like the output of your 24v inverter you have connected to your turbine is connected to you charge controller using maybe 16 gauge wire (1.291 mm not sure how you measure wire over there). If you have all 500w coming from your turbine converted to 24V that would be 20.833 A, which is much higher that what can safely be transmitted by 16 guage wire.
Edit: Oh and 6: rather than increasing the number of blades you have try increasing the length slightly. I think (based on my calculations and experience) you will be dissapinted by the decrease in rated wind speed (producing full power at lower wind) by adding blades. For an example from commercial turbines: a 90m diameter turbine is typically around 1.5 MW (1500 kW) where as a 116m can be almost 3 MW. Just make sure you get blades that are stall controlled if there are no overspeed safety systems on the turbine.
have you had anything to do with the wind generators used on sailing boats????
Thank You!
Your helpful information has gone unnoticed I see 👎
Very helpful thanks a lot!
@@jacorin the issue with wind turbines on sailing boats ( or any moving object for that matter) is they create a considerable amount of force parallel to the direction of the wind. This makes capturing energy on anything not firmly anchored in place basically impossible.
The best thing you can do to increase the efficiency of the turbine is to get it away from the house AND increase the pole height. Turbines need unobstructed, non-turbulent air flow. If the box says 4.5-meters, that is 4.5-meters above the house peak.
And above all nearby trees ...
And you got a 500W Lightning arrester as well ;)
Or buy a solar system. But, if this is UK, that won't work. 😁
@@patfranks785 coastal residence could benefit using this mini wind turbine, as the winds might frequently passing by their area at a certain height, say like 15 meters above the surface
@@patfranks785for UK better buy hydraulical system .
A few years ago I built a 10 foot wind turbine from scratch using a Hugh Piggott design and mounted it 30 feet up. On a good day it gave 1.2kw peak. It was good fun and I learned a lot but the most important thing I learned was my area isn't windy enough for a wind turbine.
Most inland areas are the same unless on a high hill.
hi, what were your wind speeds?
@@benmangan9922 not sure about the exact speed but let's say pretty windy with strong gusts.
The high plains in the u.s. in Nevada are very windy and very far inland but I think it's very sporadic
And today it's annoying the hell out of me because it's no good to be outside
I always think a great item to prioritize for these systems is your fridge. Just bring a power lead from the battery storage out to the fridge. When I was in Spain, by just putting my fridge on a timer (so it only came on about 1 hr in 3), I was able to half my electric bill. Because a typical fridge is on 24/7 and runs at 90-130 Watts.
? Are you talking about standard compressor fridge? Just lower thermostat setting. They should not work 24/7
@@Qrnl yes that's another approach. Try it and see
If you are gonna use an mppt controller, you should consider placing a few very big capacitors on the dc side of your rectifier. To stabilize the voltage.
Farads?
Obviously we want capacitors they're over 12 volts
such as 24?
15volts?
So the capacitor will store the low voltage energy from the turbine till it reaches a voltage that will charge the batteries
In parallel with the battery?
@@nekelly123 No, the voltage needs to be stabalized into the DC input of the MPPT controller, otherwise the MPPT algorithm will be confused by the 120Hz voltage changes (from 60Hz full-wave rectified). The battery voltages should be very stable on their own.
Change your drain plug on your hot water tank if you have one. For a element and dump power to heating water. That way you save on gas or oil. Depending on how your water is heated.
@Will Swift If the hot water tank is a gas/oil unit, or heated by an external boiler, then it won't have a "heater hole".
As a turbine and structural engineer of 48 years! I can tell you do not listen to these wannabes below, they know nothing. That wood will support that turbine fine.
Haha thanks! Well it hasn’t fallen down yet😁
All the armchair experts. Don't listen to them. You're not showing us for their advice
Chris got balls! He called them wannabes lol..
Thanks for your input. I really wasn't sure. I working load measurement (model validation), and dont design the towers. I jusybknow how many forces there are, and was not sure about the strength of wood. I still stand by what I said about grounding with the wood. Also not trying to be a troll, but was actually trying to provide valuable feedback.
Hi can you please discuss maintenance issues of wind turbines as I'm considering buying a system as well as solar for back up
Good show Andy. As you all saw on the 6+ videos on my channel, Mines been up almost 18 months now, not one issue, and always as long as its installed right makes over its rating.
Seen a couple of yours
I bought a Chinese 800w it worked for a month or 2 then I noticed it spinning uncontrollably I changed out the controller but somethings not right, being a permanent magnet type could something be burned out in the generator itself? I have tried a few controllers, there is open voltage when generator is spinning its a 012-24v controller on a 24v. GENERATOR I also have 24v. controllers I've tried
It was a year or two but believe it or not it was just after watching one of your videos and got the link off you I believe I ordered thru albi or Ali something like that I'm getting open circuit voltage from the 3 generator output wires but it doesn't top off battery and brake the generator anymore for some reason also it spins crazy fast in heavy wind seems like circuitry in generator to me because I have several controllers, it worked perfectly new. Oh the company in China was green something I think, thanks for answering
800w 3blade green solutions maybe not sure
@@johnpower8356 Use a standard rectifier 3 to 2 configuration 100 amp straight through to battery. If you not getting effect then it's time to check backwards up the drop cable to the Turbine. And possibly the slip ring assembly. If your turbine has been throwing its brakes a whole lot the whole time you've owned it you may have caused a high carbon buildup on your slip rings inside the turbine housing. Or you could have caused some type of corrosion on your connections below the turbine. That's the angle I would look.
Had the same problem. Had mine at 18 feet high and wasn't doing much so i raised it to 50ft made a huge difference
The 24 Volt turbine charge controller will not work correctly without a 24 Volt battery connected to it, the Victron is expecting a solar panel which can be loaded down to it's MPTT voltage of about 17 Volts for a 12 Volt system, the turbine controller is most likely in a protection mode at 17 Volts. Don't connect a battery directly to the input of your Victron either, it will over current itself and burn out, it's expecting high source impedance from the solar panel giving that characteristic knee curve you see on panel performance data.
Exactly
It might be the turbine controller since it's designed at 24v, it might not output anything if the turbine is below that. Try eliminating it and using your bridge rectifier directly to the solar charger.
Not a good idea to use a solar charge controller on a wind turbine. After reaching highest voltage limit, normally it disconnects the wind turbine's input and the turbine runs without load with the risk of overspeeding. I would recommend a 12V wind charge controller for 500W turbines.
why not try our new arrival, quite, safe and high efficiency with maglev generator. Fashion and save space.!!!
@@jeniferai6401 Sure Jenifer.... send me one and I will happily try it.
@@simfungreek I don't quite get how these turbines could overspeed... what would happen to it? it has bearings right? why can't it just spin fast if it wants to
@@chrismofer Any motor speeding over it's factory specs, could be damaged. If lucky, turbine blades would be broken before motor damage.
More turbine content please Andy. Just bought a solar setup and storage batteries and now want to look into turbines for cloudy bad weather days.
Cheers
Bro bring this to Scotland and it would spin all day every day 🤣
i have been thinking that since he mentioned it im in a windy spot
I’m currently sat in my campervan in the middle of nowhere 1hr north of Inverness lambing. It’s howling here. This would save me spinning the generator up on the shed for power when the lambs are born. 👍🏻
Yes, wet, cold and windy is the best combination!
@@kristiancdf I'm half an hour east of Inverness we've had nothing but blue skies and no wind this week 🤣
I'm moving to east Lothian next month- I'm considering getting one myself :)
Only works when the planes from Stanstead are taking off in the "right" direction?
Your asking a lot of 4 wood screws on the tower. Get it bolted.
I agree, if the winds pick up you may find yourself doing a garden turbine-shrapnel-ectomy...
Did you not hear him say it's temporary and he's gonna fix it up?
If the wind blows in a certain direction, it's actually only being held up by two of those screws (or bolts).
Imagine one day you look up at your body as your heads just been cut off and you're last thoughts were oh shit lmao
The quick answer to the title's question in the form of more questions: 1) does the turbine, in its operational lifetime, generated considerably more energy than it took to manufacture it and all the ancillary components to make it function ... assuming a comprehensive and accurate measure of manufacturing energy expended, and 2) does the consumer actually use a sizable fraction of the energy that could be generated by the turbine?
Wait so what's the answer
@@NithinJune The overall answer is "Yes" only if the answers (to #1 and #2) are "yes." Otherwise, "No."
@@cougar1861 how would you calculate - 1? We factoring in the energy required for the paint. To produce every individual bolt? If we want an true value yes we would. But ain't no one calculating that... The cost of energy required to do any of those things would fluctuate constantly... Would depend on when and where the individual components were produced. Just calculate the cost of the kit in full when you bought it and go from there. We're not manufacturing these things for profit, that's the job of the person who built the stuff to calculate that shit. And he will have factored all that into his costing for final rrp (hell be wanting a profit obviously) so if you spent 3 grand on it all, it cost less than 3 grands worth of power to produce, that's a given. Unless your buying second hand, then it just gets complicated again... Basically just go off what you paid and not worry about the rest
@@1invag I'm not picking on you/your product. I've made the same comment at every, of the many, chance I get. And I'm not talking about money "value." At this stage of imminent climate crisis, $$$ accounting has to give way to energy accounting because CO2 emission is the unavoidable consequence of fossil fuel use. Thus the appearance of alternative energy products as this wind turbine.
It's a general, very important issue: if an alternative energy "solution" requires more energy (i.e. CO2 emission) to produce than the projected "CO2-free energy" it will deliver in it's useful lifetime, then there is no reason for it to exist --- IF the overall purpose is to address the issue of climate crisis.
if you are "not manufacturing these things for profit," then what IS the reason for manufacturing them, if not to provide a valid alternate energy source, as above?
@@cougar1861 thanks I couldn't have put it better myself
How about putting a capacitor in between to power the meter and have some more constant loading.
Specially if you wanna feed it to your house. A constant, smooth supply without peaks is always better, there some pre finished models to replace a car battery which I assume to be a good solution
Really makes me appreciate how drama-free and relatively easy solar is. Was considering diversifying the renewable power for my off-grid bus but wind seems impractical for my purposes. Thanks for the video!
Solar is wildly expensive I know assholes that try to charge $50,000 to rig up an entire house, wind on the other hand just requires electric motors and mechanical energy very primitive and cheap by comparison. The big disadvantage of wind energy though is that you have to actually be good at physics you can't just guess. Where as installing solar panels is a mindless task similar to installing shingles. If you're smart, but poor wind is an excellent option. If you're rich and dumb go with solar.
@@SF-dy6hn why'd you respond to my comment lol
@@natebaird To correct you. Wind can be cheaper and more profitable than solar and as for drama that's all just personal perspective isn't it?
@@SF-dy6hn lol you're a trip, man. Glad wind is working out for you. The more renewable energy, the better.
I was warned about just running my dump circuit to a grid tie. It's good until there is a power disruption from the utility so, there has to be some backup. I'll keep watching you for inspirational ways to get around that issue. Nice setup.
Why dont you setup the dump circuit to enable a electronic brake for the turbine when the voltage drops the solenoid disables the brake and allows the turbine to spin again?
An electric water heater can be a dump with benefits (at least until it reaches temperature!) but a big resistance dump is probably best unless you can afford to take the risk of the blades or bearings failing)
So ideally you want to harness the wind power so you have plenty of excess and somewhere to dump the excess you don't need, maybe an extra turbine if needed, automated so that it dumps power somewhere useful when your batteries are full.
I would get a big fan plugged into an extension cord and mount on the pole next to the wind turbine. When there is no wind ,I would just turn the fan on to make it turn.
stonks
absolutely ABSURD. you should crawl back to the creche.
Love how it's a wind turbine to be more eco yet it's package in..... styrofoam....
When you get 8ms it will shock you in output. But please increase your wire size if its under 8awg in that length of run. And guy wire it, plus ad 3 meters higher.
Your on to it, saved me posting. Thanks. I also wondered if the MPPT on the charge controller was quick enough to react on days when it is not a constant wind.
I was considering one of these on top of my campervan alongside my solar as obviously it will be going 10 to the dozen on the motorway ect.
Gutted I got a 12v one, next to useless with the wind we have here in Surrey. Run my man cave from 6 100w panels, 4 x 110ah leisure batteries on a 12v system with 3.5kw inverter. I get 4 hours of 3 double strip lights, drill chargers, gadgets n gizmos. Just about self sustaining with 2-3 in the cave sessions a week if there’s a bit of sunshine about. This Easter weekend I’m off, sun is forecast it should be whopping the amps in with a lot of cave time. I bought the turbine the same time as the panels. I’m hoping it will be the top up in the winter months when there is less sunshine and less cave time. However like yourself I have been monitoring it when it’s having a whizz and it ain’t much cop. That charger you have is the same as mine, just different voltage apparently it has a brake for the turbine (that’s from Chinese supplier) to stop overcharging and turbine over speed so probably uses a fet to short the windings.
I went and got a Victron 150/35 pv, BMV 702 and the Venus network interface to replace the Renogy rover 40. And mad coincidence I got the bridge rectifier too. I’m going to cut out the the standard controller, fit the bridge rec and fire it into the Renogy box. I don’t hold out much hope as it’s a 12v turbine but like you say toyz to play with. I reckon my system should pay for itself about 3 years after I’m dead 😂 enjoy your vids keep em coming.
I think it goes without saying that wind + solar is the efficient combination
Thanks for sharing your information...nice to hear from others their set up...
I had six 100 watt panels but in July I added four more ; when I did my amps doubled...I have six 110 AH batteries and eight 90 AH ones...I bought the smaller ones at first so I could save up for an Aims Power 2000 watts inverter / charger 24 volts...I used a 40 amp Epever controller...so far , every time I think about a wind generator I wind up getting two more solar panels
@@davidpotter9462 it’s not until you get a wind generator that you realise how little wind there is when you want it. 😂
Had a 12 volt Missouri turbine since 2017 and just a car battery,and not connected to the grid.No problems so far,soon will connect sun panels too and buy lifepo battery,also changed to led strips light both color and just white.Also have 24 and 48 volt wind gens of which the 24 volt will be installed outside the barn for led strips and charging electic forklifter.Thank you.
I am trying to use a wind generator as a fan and it spins reliably.
And it works well with solar panels.
This video has everything. It's a cocktail of emotion
Before we even mention 'dump loads', does that wind gen self regulate in high winds?
If it does, then my experience thus far (with similar products) is that it will burn out during the first storm (prolonged high winds) you get.
You need to fit a dump load circuit for any decent wind gen and FULL MARKS for recovering that power! But my experience thus far with high performance wind gens that are manufactured using chinesium is that they will burn out......they cannot handle the sustained generation of power in high winds, EVEN with dump loads.
The dump load protects the battery bank from 'over-volts', it DOES NOT stop the wind gen from turning and producing power; I've seen (marine rated/claimed) gens go into 'brake mode' in high winds...I've seen them burned out a few weeks later...............more than once, twice, trice.....
I have also witnessed a 150w rated wind gen, of comparable size, with a dump load (MorningStar?) on a deserted, windblown islet in the Shetlands, perform for years and survive serious storms...wish I could remember the manufacturer, I believe German, but salutary lesson, don't believe all the claims for a product and don't go for the highest claimed power, sometimes you have to pay for the good stuff.
I wish you luck,
The ones that come stock with sailing boats are usually good quality if that can help your search.
Those crappy little controllers just short the windings to break them.
How ever this one won't as it's not connected to the battery. But the MPPT controller with a totally unsuitable algorithm on it.
Thanks for using Miles Per Hour, & making the whole thing understandable.👍
At 1 penny of electricity per day ... Do you now understand that it is worthless?
The victron is telling you the amount of power that HAS been stored into the battery the the rc meter is telling you the power production the difference is charging losses. With mppt solar best if input voltage is 1.5-3x battery voltage with wind you want to get as close to the max input as you can. You need a pwm charger with a buck-boost support. Also look into ideal diodes using half-bridge mosfet you can save a lot of power and add braking functionality. I made cust firmware for a 100A opto hobby esc turning it into a ideal diode and buck boost charger by using a feedback.
Today I learned about IC DC and Soda Panels. :D
😂😂😂👍
Lol 😄
I would consider what the output from the three phase Controller is, if the victron input is the MPPT type, it needs more than 12v-18v to utilize the power coming in from the wind or solar, so basically, if the three phase Controller is output isn't outputting the 24v that the mppt controller needs to work at it's best, then you might need to get rid of the controller that came with the turbine and Go directly from the rectifier to the victron.. hope this helps 🙂
No, nothing will help "junk" ...
I bought the 600 watts version of the same thing. Looks just like the one you have. I also ordered the 24 volts model. They sent me the same controller you have there. It didn't work out because they sent me a 12 volts model turbine. So I ordered a 200 amps rectifier and hooked it up with some cables I got with a cheap inverter that had some big alligator clips on them. So I have twenty marine batteries, it has to charge one side of ten, or the other. I just switch it around. From what I can tell it's putting about 140 watts into the batteries with a good wind. It doesn't put out enough to need a dump load. It can't overcharge the battery bank. I bought two more 100 watts solar panels, so I have 1400 watts of those things now. I think the problem with both of our turbines is the same ; I believe they must be wound with aluminum wire. I ordered a 24 volts model, but this one puts out 18-21 volts a lot of the time. It's windy enough here for a turbine most of the time. There are two short videos, just a few seconds long, of it spinning on my channel. That is the only thing I can think of that would make the voltage be so low. I'm going to have to fix it or get another one, I guess. I don't know whether to use it as is, and buy a different one, or try to rewind it with copper and possibly destroy it, and buy another. I have a theory that in order to get 24 volts out of one of these things, you have to get the 48 volts one, so they have to use copper to get that much voltage. I'm not sure but I think that's what the deal is. They don't tell you that in the advertisement. And I would bet that the 48 volts version costs a lot more. I doubt if you can buy just the stator, but I don't know that. I agree, solar is easiest. Just aim those panels and go. March average wind speed here is 10.2. There's a cold front coming down out of Colorado, so I'll get wind all night now. When I got mine, the crush plate holes were for a different one, maybe an 800 watts. I had to slot them and then use washers, so I had to go get longer bolts. I got higher grade bolts than they sent. I have room for nuts on the back of six of them. I used a fender washer on the outside three but had to grind part of them off so the nose cone would go on. I've had it up for six days. It's been windy for about four of those. After I get a different one put up and working, I will have to take this one apart and see why there is aluminum wire coming off the slip rings. Maybe the stator is copper, just 12 v. I don't know. It's not really good enough like it is, unless it's pretty windy every day. I'm using mine, but it's kind of a Gilligan's Island set up, I have to switch it from one set of ten batteries to the other side. If I hooked it up 24 volts, the prairie wind might tear it apart. So having it 12 v, it doesn't turn fast as it would 24, I guess. I'm getting some high wind now. There's a front coming down. Sounds like it's around 45 MPH wind. The only other thing I can think of, there's an electric motor rebuilders place here, I could get copper wire put in it there, but jeez they charge a lot. But no bigger than this little guy is, it might not cost too much. So if I try to rewire it, and can't do it, that's the last option. But if they do it, it'll make 50 volts probably. If I can get some copper wire in it, and get some voltage out if it, I'll buy a good charge controller for it. I have a DC motor that makes 79 volts that I may put some blades on, as well. It should make 350 watts or so, it's a half horse. I wrapped a cord around the 3 inch pulley and pulled it made 79 volts three times in a row. I can make a wind generator out of it. Just curious if you have thought about rewind it for a different voltage. I'm thinking about finding some 15% silver wire, get it rewound with it, and send them a picture of it. I don't know why they can't get their heads out of their asses and build some decent wind generators. I had to turn the hotplate on, the wind is howling, voltage spiking to 29.3 The darn thing works, just half way. With these 50 MPH gusts, I could probably hook it up 24 volts. Crazy stuff. I guess it's like buying an inverter, you have to get a junky one or two before you figure out how to get a better one. Maybe the 500 watts rating is during a small tornado. If it was copper wire wound it will probably make 510 watts. But then they wind it with aluminum wire and it never makes the rating. They just don't put that in the advertisement
I started with a Rutland mounted on a pole on the shed, but it suffered from too much turbulance and didn't do a lot even in a hurricane. I then fitted an airbreeze on the side of the house. When it really ripped, The noise in the house sounded like a Chinook was landing on the roof. I tried to video the noise indoors but the sound never came out properly. In 4 years I dont think it paid for itself. I took it down when I built my extension, but I wouldn't mind a bigger one on a mast. Just need to get it high enough above the rooftops to get over the turbulance.
Great. Congrats. Inspires me to tackle the wind too.
Windmills are great i love wind turbines🤗
WHY ?
I always get a 50 watt loss from the Victron to my batteries. Dump load into a water heater element, in your water heater, free heat saves natrual gas.
You didn't mention price that I remember. I like seeing these new energy sources. Now a big fan as of yet. My uncle bought 6 for $100,000 and they were junk in a year. I think there was some contentious conversation between his employee and the installation person, he removed the brakes.
6 for 100,000 ahahahaha he got ripped off these cost like $300 each lmao
You need both wind & solar to be sure to get some power!
For most people, a Wind Turbine will just drain your wallet of all cash ...
I would like four of these, in every corner in our house to the top of maybe flag pole:) maybe high velosity power train to cellar where generator could be, common of quartet😀
Did some quick math on his 60 watts over 2.5 hrs: at $.12/kWh retail here in Indiana (US), it would be on track to save roughly $25/year. If he only spent $1k on the total array (including time), a bank CD earning 2.5% would be equivalent (unless factors changed of course).
40 Year to break-even !!! ( = $1,000 / $25 per year ). It will fail before it ever earns the $1,000 original investment . So it earns *NOTHING* . It is a toy...
@@MrSummitville Failed after 2 years . . . . $1000/2 = $500/year . . . . Definitely NOT worth it.
Ah, Andy, you seem like a lovely chap. Really enjoyed the video.
Thanks 👍
Does the pole have a lightning ground?
Yep, the lithium batteries 👍
😳
I bought an 800w chinese turbine running 24v. Today it was 50mph wind, and gusting over that. I was getting 101w and in gusts maybe 138w
Typical ...
If you had a storage area to collect water up high in a hill then there would be no need for battery controllers etc and the turbines could run pumps directly mechanically then tat would be the best system and when power is required the water would run down hill under gravity flow to run a big generator when required.
Or have it running a compressor with a big air vessel buried in the ground and run your Genny from the compressed airline
You are in Great Britain that have about 30% of Europe's wind,I thought that your wind Turbine should generate more than it's rated out put. I am dissatisfied by the numbers that it is outputting.
Regardless any Renewables are better.
Small scale Solar PV is better
Thanks for the video!
"Regardless any Renewables are better." I'm confused. Better than what and better at what?
@@RetiredRhetoricalWarhorse. Better than Household Wind Turbines
Good video Andy - I love wind turbines, but I think this particular one isn't worth it because it's far too small to be useful, and little more than a toy. Still, it's fun to play with!
With blade lengths of a couple of metres or more, then you're looking at multiple kW, but also planning issues with the council. Only really suitable for rural areas and rich landowners really.
Or people with diesel generators for when its not windy!!!
Depends on your purpose, not everybody's installing renewables to "run the house" or "pay for itself". Anything you can generate at home takes load off the grid, and the solar generator revolution is just getting started. My little Anker only puts out 300 watts, it doesn't need charging with 5000!
~~~~~~ SOLAR BY DAY, WIND BY NIGHT 😊~~~~~~
This would be perfect for all those cold windy nights in Canada.
You cant charge at night with solar but with wind you could still charge when the sun goes down or while you sleep.
i wonder if you made a dyson type in their hoovers cyclone funnels cone at front of the blades circumference would amplify the pressure air ratio
lol no! you're creating drag! Works great when connected to a motor a plugged into a wall though obviously!
i was thinking the cyclone vortex would create a back vacuum suck vortex at the rear of the blades like when you whistle the sound must come from pressurised vibrational friction/air cause
@Andy Kirby the discrepancy is most likely due to the fact that your using a mppt - which senses a while and adjusts on load change. theese are not particulairly great for such fluctuating loads. use a pwm fed by the rectifier from the wind turbine in parallel to the mppt from pv & batteries instead to not loose that power (Wind ->Rect->fuse->pwm->fuse->batt). btw. loving what you do - i am pretty similar minded haha from europe - germany. actually want to get a twizzy sometime ( loved what you did with it ). Kind of want to do the same - tires + twizzy box for commuting :)
Wind turbines are all about position and height. Took us ages to get the sweet spot. Then of course in winter to windy can be a problem. More erratic production but wind can be 24hrs not just daylight. Most benefit in short winter days then solar better in longer summer days.
In what city do you live, that has strong winds 24 hours per day? How high is your tower? What brand and model wind turbine?
Thank You for All that you are doing for World Peace and for our Planet...
Peace.. Shalom.. Salam.. La Paz.. Namaste ..
🙏🏻 😊 🌈 ✌ ☮️ ❤️ 🕊
3 phase cable and one of the 3 has earth colour code :) as long as they're all the same guage it doesn't matter.
do you realize you rendered your Own comment, pointless.
@@daviddavids2884 I found it insightful. Kinda
I'm sure it would run an electric fan of similar size! ;D
A much smaller fan ...
Even still people buying these windturbines advertising 500watts or more and not even reaching half of whats advertised!! That literally is insane😂
Half?!? 10-15% of what´s advertised.
If your allowed you should put it higher and it will work better even in low winds.i used to have mine as high as yours worked alright b.ut now it's on top of my roof and works so much so much better
I get to see the Rampion Wind Farm out of my window these days :-)
I'm in the same room for me to do
I'm in Adelaide and have been looking
I'm in a hurry
I'm not going for it now though
I'm not going
"is it worth it"...dunno how much is the turbine?
Came here for this, I haven't watched the full video yet, but I doubt we will findout from the video. I've already down voted this..
Not worth $0.00
It's the Copper I tell you, the copper.
The Copper, or the lack of it.
When there is no wind I would get my 5 year old great grandson to run around the garden with it he's fast sure to get a few volts 😂😂
I saw a video of guy with same stuff. He used that rectifier but still used the included controller just for the brake function. Seems to work well.
If your near a stream, use a water turbine! Water runs everyday all day!
Waterlily do one, if not buying then a washing machine motor can generate well...
my PC can now turn on when its windy
2 3kw hivawTs and 20kw of solar with battery bank, build house anywhere In world
Better get eating beans
Andy, get 24 volts worth of SLA batteries, about 80ah to use to run the turbines 24v power into, from them send into a LiPo controller for your lithium bank. Looks like your kicking it nice. Its called slave batteries. In my 11 years of installing wind turbines I usually put 48 volt turbine, to charge Lithium.
I took 4 formwork props and the bautri-system and set up my wind turbine quickly and cheaply at a height of 6m in an open field
I can recommand proper controller, this one can not user wind generator correctly.
Which controller do you recommend
@@mteca5093 For instance Midnite controllers do have hydro and wind source features...
Interesting content but a handheld steadicam and a small desktop tripod would make the videos easier to watch.
Electrically heated in floor coils can absorb a lot of off grid electricity. Insulated thermal mass concrete and tile floors could be heated with the windy winter. Is it windy in your winter season?
I'm just glad he knows his single phase cable from his 3 phase cable 👍😄
I'm a subscriber mate, just razzn ya😅
mate, you will absolutely find you wasted your money. i found a solar panel makes about 400 times more money for the same money. but hei, everybody is entitled to make their own experiences.
True but this will work at night as well. I came to the same conclusion as you when I figured out I'd need about 40km/h winds to do anything useful with.
Like he said, don’t get one to save money. A hybrid system will give a better average power output over the year than a single resource system. The problem lies in the position of the turbine, and average wind speed at your location. The potential output of a turbine increases with the rotor diameter squared, but also with the wind speed cubed. The turbine needs to be 10m above all closest obstructions to ensure laminar flow over the blades.
@@MrCarlRobinson just buy more pv.
I gotta find myself a link to your music. Im losing concentration by those sweet beats
Hey thanks! I’m on Spotify and all the other streaming platforms, search my name Andy Kirby😁
hahaha, thought i was the only one
The most efficient has one blade but balance is an issue. Two blades get interference vibration at 2x per rev. Three blades is a good compromise. 5 blades will make it turn slower.
one blade is perfect, but you do a vertical instead of horizontal blade. it works no matter where the wind comes from but you will have slight obstructions from the stuff that holds the top of the blade so it isn't only connected at the bottom, but they are VERY efficient and spins from wind from any direction, even turbulent one
@@LiLBitsDK A VAWT is worse ...
I lived aboard in a marina for years. Another boater had a wind turbine that made a bothersome sound while in operation. Such a device might be good if you live in the country, but not in close quarters.
So far every turbine video I've seen has been disappointing, as far as output.
Of course ...
Is it worth it? No.
If you connect that up to a blow lamp and set it alight it would go up a treat.
I put a wind charger up in 2002. Only had lead acid batteries really back then. I remember it took a few days to start up I think the bearings just need to free up a little. Thing to remember is solar only produces in the day and optimal in the summer when wind is 24/7 and best in winter :) it’s a good combo. One night in a storm mine was going crazy off the scale on power.
Wind is *NOT* 24/7. Where do you live, that you get 10m/s or 25mph steady wind, 24x7 ???
@@MrSummitville oh yeah should have put potentially it’s 24/7
Nebraska would be a good place to sell these. The wind blows strong all day long every day. In fact, one day when it stopped everybody fell over.
Tornado Alley ...
Don't sweat it yet. Come winter time, when the sun is low in the sky and the days are short, there's a real good chance, that wind turbine does the "heavy lifting". You may have simply picked the wrong season, to get the good capacity factor out of the turbine.
I had a brilliant neighbor of mine that thought he could get free energy by putting a wind turbine on his car as he drove down the road 😂😂😂
since you are running this into a MPPT, you really should have gone for the 48v model. this way you would be more likely to have a voltage higher than your min MPPT voltage. If this doesn't make sense, hit me back and I will explain.
Those turbines would definitely work in Cape Town South Africa.
Only when the South Easter blows.....
I bought a similar turbine on eBay five blade 12 V found it was only ever good in really windy days!! Like it had to be making the swooshing noise for it to make power at all, just spinning quickly wasn't enough. But when that thing was spinning it was chucking 4-5 Amps at 12 V at least into my power bank. Living in the UK it's quite a good feeling after few days of overcast (Little solar) and then have storm blow through and wake up to a fully charged battery bank bliss. My off grid home is in the valley with a persistent Direction of wind but getting the turbine high as possible is key.
Wind Turbines are RATED at 11m/s or 25 mph. So, who has that that?
I have the same blurry-eyed feeling you get in a hi-fi shop.
My local council in Australia need Development approval for wind turbines in residential areas. We also need insurance in case the turbine comes flying off and kills someone.
Its good law but insane for you , anyway don,t worry wind turbines not pay of its waste of money most people forgot to take in account inflation and life spam is to short .
Those little meter are handy things. I need a few more here. I'm going to use a Plug N Play Grid tie for a Dump Load. Every bit off the bill helps. Here in the desert South West of New Mexico our winds are way more productive.
Thanks! My solar panel break even point is 1 year with current kWh price of roughly 0.90 EUR instead of the usual 0.22 EUR.
Thing are crazy here so looking for solutions to get more self sufficient. Wind power is not near as reliability and power production as solar but all small amounts help. We have black-outs as well due to overload on the power grid. AC jumped from ~220V to sometimes 250V which can be harmful to some electronics.
Since everyone puts in their .02cents. The longer the wire is the more resistance in the system at low voltage. I’m thinking it would be more efficient to have the batteries charge controller and inverter very close to the windmill and to have 220v sent from there since 220v does same amount of work with half the energy and can travel longer distances on the copper wire. Of course gold wires would be the ultimate medium to transport energy. I’m thinking about how the Egyptian pyramids may have been a huge hydro battery system. The caps were apparently made of gold. Also to control the speed of the windmill it would extract further upward or downward as a governor in higher wind conditions so as not to over spin.
العالمي والمحلي والمهراجان والمدرسي الثانوي والكلي والجامعي والمنظمات والبداعي والختراعي
Interesting to see how the turbine holds up to wear and tear. I wonder how is it for water resistance?
The reason your Victron is showing less peak power than your monitor is because the Victrons MPPT can't keep up with the constantly changing peaks and troughs of the generator output. A large reservoir capacitor directly across your Chinese charge controller output would improve this.
I hear vertical turbines are supposed to be better near houses, they do better with turbulent wind, which is common in built up areas. Horizontal turbines like this are better much higher up however.
*All practical tests show that small wind turbines hardly generate any electricity! And only at very high costs!*
Because there is hardly any wind close to the ground. It is also extremely gusty, which usually shortens the service life.
Only if you need to be self-sufficient from the power grid, you should have the largest possible wind turbine for the winter on a high mast.
*With solar modules, on the other hand, you can reliably generate green electricity for 25 years at approx. 3-10 cent/kWh!*
Looking at local wind data we average around 10mph a year. The trick to that is it is measured at 10m above ground level though.
Yes, you need a tall tower. The taller the better. The wind turbine must be much higher than all objects near it ...
People always ask alot of renewable energy in your home vs cost - you need to remember your fighting against billions of dollars worth of infrastructure regarding power. if that was yet to be put in place, these items would be absolutely world changing.
Yeah you are right. I think The infrastructure is setup to make excess energy so that it can be wasted actually, and that’s what most of us do. When you start creating your own energy it changes your mind set towards how you use it which is ironic really as we should have done that before going to the trouble of making our own energy!
Solar hydrogen needs no high voltage but high current for low temperature electrolysis.
Perhaps high speed small rotor generators are perfect for that.
replace victron with a high watt buck converter. set the buck to the max voltage of the batteries and thats it.
Yes that sounds like the best thing to do 👍
that's what i've done to my one of these which also never generates high enough output voltage to even start charging a 12V battery without a buck boost converter
I'd definitely get a wind turbine as a supplement to solar, but not wind by itself
Someone else mentioned that a wind turbine can keep your batteries warm over night. One pkace that a wind turbine would work really well would be near the coast. There is normally a wind generated there.
The salt water will rust the iron inside. You think that is a good idea?