There was no practical space for a tower so I installed the Windtura 750 on the crest of my cottage. You can hear it groaning a little from inside, but the kids say they like it and since we're not there most of the time it can be on while we're away and off if it is bothering anyone. Goal is to charge my 24v battery bank which runs a cab heater that keeps the pipes in the kitchen and basement from freezing. The wind is dirty because of trees and neighboring houses, but it got to 300+ watts on day 1 in gusty 20 knot wind that's typical for winter on the lake. There are often power outages in the winter too, so having a back-up source of power to run my Rinnai propane heater will be great. I'm still tinkering with the wiring and looking forward to good advice on this forum. I hope the turbine likes the view as much as I do! View attachment 924
I have a set of those blades hanging in the garage. I'm tempted to do the same thing to my garage too get around the 15 foot height limit here. I'd like it to fold down during the daylight hours so my servents won't turn me in. Ideas are welcome...........
Very nice set up. Looks great!! Very cool to gethe kids involved. I would recommend a small solar panel as well to gauruntee your bats are always replenished to a degree. I have those blades too and am experimenting with them on my Wind Max HY 400 right now. They do have goosd surface area. They also start up in very low winds loke 3 MPH however getting to the right RPM needed for my 400 w PMA is yet to be seen as i have had no real good winds since i put them on. Anyway again really nice idea and set up. Have you done a calculations on run time for the heater vs battery power? I wish you well with it.
I do aspire to solar, but the site is marginal with tall pines and a hill to the south. Something small after I get the wind set-up all sorted out. A wave energy system that uses the rocking of the swim raft would be an interesting challenge! The large swept area on the Windy Nation blades was a big factor in my decision on what system to go with. A pleasant surprise is that they're very quiet - this will be key when my neighbors show-up and see what I've been up to. The cab heater is 15amps on a 24v circuit, so that's 360watts when on (assuming I understand this stuff). That'll certainly outpace the turbine most of the time, so it really depends how much that little heater has to run to keep the space at 45 degrees. I've insulated well and minimized the heated area to where there's plumbing (~1,500 cubic feet), but NH winter is pretty darn cold. I expect to lose the battle Jan through March and win in Dec and April. Overall, I hope to cut the electric bill 25-50%. We'll see!
Been tripping over myself and not quite settled on what to do with the electricity. I started out w/ the battery plan above, but the batteries are old and of 2 brands, and my multimeter is confusing, so I wasn't confident in the set-up. I was eager to try the 500w grid-tie inverter, so I set that up, but quickly burned out 2x wind meters in the process (my bad for mixing what end connects to what while the turbine was spinning). It works, but the relay in the inverter is supposedly not up for heavy long-term dumping, so I've been worrying about that (with the turbine on the house consequences of something burning out when I'm not there seems pretty high). Good new is it hasn't ripped itself off the roof, it isn't too noisy, it does produce, and I've got most of the ingredients to finish the job. Just need to get more time up north!
