Build your own windmill workshop course on Scoraig April 26th

Posted on 27/01/2014 by hugh

I am planning to hold a course here on Scoraig at the end of April.  We’ll build and test a wind turbine as usual.  Accommodation is provided from Saturday 26th April to Saturday 3rd May.  These will be the arrival and departure days.  The course will run for six days from 27th to 2nd.  Your partner may be able to find accommodation here too without attending the workshop. Please ask for details.

See photos of 2012 course and 2013 course and a video.   Cost will be £750 including accommodation.  I may be able to offer a limited number of student discounts if there are enough people paying full price.

Contact me for more details and to book a place.  I do not plan to travel around teaching courses this year as I have done over the last 12 years or so.  This may be your only opportunity to be taught by me personally, although there are several other groups worldwide offering courses based on my Recipe Book or derivatives of it.

Posted in construction, courses, Scoraig | 7 Comments

“How to” get feed in tariffs with a Powerspout hydro turbine

Posted on 25/01/2014 by hugh

Useful links to understanding how to claim feed-in tariffs in the UK.  These tariffs are available on or off grid, but may be phased out next year 2019.

BabyHydro DIY installation guide 2016 with details of how to obtain relevant consents in Scotland.

Energy savings Trust guide to Feed in Tariffs

Here is a document from 2013 describing the steps to obtain Feed in Tariffs for a Powerspout in England and Wales, but now rather out of date although it may help.  I am told that OFGEM now want three inputs; planning, network and EA(or latest equivalent).

Posted in hydro, products/technical | Leave a comment

News from Tanzania

Posted on 17/01/2014 by hugh

With great success, the first partner project between I Love Windpower Tanzania (ILWPT) and Engineers Without Borders (EWB) UK branch at the University of Warwick took place in September 2013 in the village of Kemgesi, Serengeti region, Tanzania.

The new partnership (facilitated by James Low of Wind Empowerment) saw the two groups install a 1kW wind turbine to provide electricity for a girls boarding school at the Dr Omar Ali Secondary School.

Read the whole story here at “I love Windpower”

Posted in construction, courses, developing world, People | 2 Comments

Newsletter from Tripalium in France

Posted on 15/01/2014 by hugh

Tripalium newsflash:

goodbye 2013, hello 2014

tripa
Tripalium held 17 training courses in 2013. One of the highlights of the year was Hugh’s
visit in May followed by the annual meet-up of the thirty odd people who make up
Tripalium. A maintenance guide has been completed and progress is ongoing on a new
version of the manual modified to be more adapted to the French audience.
2013 also went out with a storm, Hurricane Dirk managed to bend one tower, throw-off
one tail, and overload a grid-tied regulator. The bent tower was attributed to the upper
guy wires not being tight enough; the tail was most likely caused by a light disequilibration
of the blades; as for the regulator, we are asking SMA to replace it under
warranty. Not a great way to start 2014.
For 2014, the new manual is nearing the finish, even if correcting the last details will
probably take several months. The wireframe for a new website has been done, so a
new website should be online before the summer. Also this spring, using the new
maintenance guide as a model, we are planning to do our first e-learning video. If this
works well, perhaps we will try to capture some of the steps of building a turbine on
video with clear explanations to each step. And not to forget there are already six
training course dates fixed for 2014.

www.tripalium.org

Posted in Books, construction, courses, France, People | 2 Comments

Power curve data for 3 metre recipe turbine on Scoraig

Posted on 29/12/2013 by hugh

I have been using a Mobile Logger from Logic Energy to collect data on a 3 metre diameter turbine close to my house.  The turbine is built to the Recipe Book.  In the gallery you can see the site and the measurement mast, which comes from Radioworld.

The data is interesting.  There is a different power curve for south wind coming up the slope from the north wind blowing down the hill to the turbine.  The tower is accurately vertical.  This is an example of how site-dependent a power curve is.  It depends on many factors including the particular machine, actual battery voltage, cable resistance, and even the wind direction in most cases.

Jon Leary and I have done studies on a number of turbines on Scoraig over the last year or two.  I hope to be able to publish more comprehensive information in due course.

Posted in construction, power curve data, Scoraig | 1 Comment

Ampair announces exclusive negotiations to acquire Westwind.

Posted on 03/12/2013 by hugh

Ampair, the Dorset-based wind turbine manufacturer, is pleased to announce that it is in exclusive negotiations to acquire Westwind, the Belfast-based wind turbine manufacturer. Ampair, with over 40-years’ experience, is the UK’s oldest manufacturer of wind turbines.  Westwind relocated from Australia to the UK several years ago and now offers the widest range of MCS certified turbines of any manufacturer.

Ampair’s managing director David Sharman said “this acquisition immediately enables us to offer a wind turbine solution from 100W through to 20kW, which is a unique position and which will be to the benefit of our worldwide client base. Ampair’s smaller turbines and Westwind’s larger MCS-certified turbines neatly span the full range”. Andrew Graham, managing director of Westwind said “This is an important step for both companies. We have long been impressed by Ampair and it became clear that they were the natural partner for us with their strong engineering and worldwide sales”.

Staff of both companies have been kept informed and operations will continue at both sites. This announcement is being made so that suppliers and customers can be kept informed. With immediate effect Ampair/Westwind turbines are available; from the smallest 100W-600W units for powering scientific equipment and yachts, through 5kW and 10kW turbines for householders, to the larger 20kW turbines of interest to farmers, small businesses, telecoms applications and off-grid communities.

For more information contact [email protected]  or visit www.ampair.com

Posted in products/technical, UK small wind scene | Leave a comment

Vertical axis in decline

Posted on 30/11/2013 by hugh

The MCS approved list of small wind turbines includes 31 models, but none of them are vertical axis any more.

Quiet Revolution QR5, the darling of the architects, is no longer listed there.  Instead the company have quietly shifted to marketing a chinese machine, the Hy5

A news story about the quiet revolution turbine “£48k wind turbine creates £5 of power a month”.  Bad siting of poorly chosen technology has proved another huge embarrassment for the wind industry once again. Mick Sagrillo’s comment: “So, what’s your problem?  It’s a VAWT.  They don’t need tall towers or exposed sites, remember?”

Meantime James Alan Rowan of Mag-Wind has been indicted for his fraudulent activities around vertical axis hype and nonsense.

But there is still a lot of vertical axis hype around on the web, and people still seem to love it.

Posted in UK small wind scene | 5 Comments

Wind turbine kits in Ireland

Posted on 24/11/2013 by hugh

Posted in construction, People | 4 Comments

Wind tunnel test compared with theory in Portugal

Posted on 22/11/2013 by hugh

João P. Monteiro has done some interesting studies of the performance of a 1200 diameter Recipe blade set in a wind tunnel and compared the results with theoretical predictions of a couple of simulation progams.  The results are close.  It’s unusual to see real world data for the Cp (performance) versus tip-speed-ratio.  This can help us design wind turbines to avoid stall and maximise efficiency.

The full article in Journal of Wind Engineering and Industrial Aerodynamics is for sale here.

 

Posted in construction, People, power curve data | 1 Comment

Rural Electrification Research Group Survey Results

Posted on 17/11/2013 by hugh

See this page for details of the results so far from this survey.  Why not join in and contribute to the survey?

Here are a couple of the many charts on the results page:

survey1survey2

See all the results here

 

Posted in construction, courses, People | Leave a comment