Want to make energy please.

[ieezitin]

Gentlemen

I want to make an engine/engines to charge a 12/24 volt electrical system that could run 8 hours a day.

 My fuel/energy resources are endless wood, solar and wind.

I have adequate Turning, milling and shaping capabilities and a healthy knowledge on the use of them.

I really want to use existing parts from old discarded equipment re-cycle you could say.

My weaknesses   are in the electrical and computer side of the equipment to where I would turn to the board for help anyway
.
What do you suggest and why.

Anthony

[DavidA]

I would just buy a Lister single cylinder Diesel and save yourself a lot of trouble. Why re-invent the wheel ?

You can run it from gas,  wood gas,  Diesel,  Bio Diesel etc.

Dave

[ieezitin]

Dave

I already have alternative energy power generation available in the form of a two cylinder diesel 8KW generator and it’s not my main reason for doing this.

I need a long term project to work on that will challenge me where I can learn new things. I am really interested in making machines that have a practical use. I have 10 acres and the area I live in is prone to power failures, using my own energy that I have produced intrigues me.

I want to get into electronics more and this would be a great opportunity.
Anthony.

[John Hill]

How about a horizontal axis wind turbine?

[DavidA]

Maybe a Savonious Rotor.

These operate at much lower speeds and start easily in a breeze.

You could make one out of a fifty gallon drum cut in half length-ways.

Dave.

[Lew_Merrick_PE]

Maybe a Savonious Rotor.

These operate at much lower speeds and start easily in a breeze.

You could make one out of a fifty gallon drum cut in half length-ways.

Actually, a Savonious system requires more base wind-speed than any well designed propeller type of turbine unless you go to fair extreme in managing your mass/mass-distribution (i.e. polar moments of inertia).  The 55-gallon drum version is incredibly inefficient.  Savonious tossed that together for the Red Army during WWII as a, If you are out in the middle of nowhere and you need wind-powered torque... suggestion.  The armor divisions had plenty of 55-gallon drums lying about.

My ex-wife came across a copy of Igor Savonious' notebooks why studying in France back in the 1970's.  She copied and translated them for me and I believe that my copy is the only English translation (now rather badly deteriorated) in existence.  I have (successfully) built and installed three sets of various Savoneious turbines over the years.  The ones I installed in Kotzebue (AK) back in the 70's worked the best because the issues was not available wind speed, it was surviving extremely high winds.  The units were covered with a canister that had venturi inlet/outlet controls that maintained a (fairly) constant delta-pressure across the system and had the advantage of turning the whole thing into a vertical airfoil when wind speeds got too high.

If you are actually going to get anything resembling efficiency out of a Savonious-type of device, you need to exhaust your flows from the center of the unit, not pass them through.  I wasted huge amounts of epoxy & glass cloth learning that aspect of them.

[sparky961]

Lew:
Since you seem to be something of an expert on the subject, would there be a good reason not to build a Savonious Rotor with a horizontal axis?  I think making the support structure could be simplified if oriented that way.

Also, what did you mean by exhausting out the center?  Most designs I've looked at are open to the opposite side in the center (they overlap).  Is that sufficient?

Maybe you can point to some information on an efficient design for one of these?

Thanks..

[sparky961]

Boy, do I feel stupid... Ok, I know the reason why you wouldn't mount it horizontally.  Wind direction.

Sometimes I can't see the forest for the trees... ;)

[ieezitin]

Guys

Through my research so far coming from what’s been stated on another forum is that wood gasification maybe a viable option and pretty simple to boot.

I see the main two possibilities here, taking the syngas off for fuel and installing a Stirling engine on top capturing radiant heat.

Two questions:  Would a IC engine need to have the syngas supplied to it under slight pressure if not what’s needed? A brief concept I just need to understand the process.

The Stirling, where can I find/buy plans to build an adequate size machine? Is there any particular model, concept  and or style recommended?

A Savonious system is ok but this would kill a couple of birds with one stone.

The more I get involved in this the more interesting its becoming.

Anthony.

[AdeV]

Through my research so far coming from what’s been stated on another forum is that wood gasification maybe a viable option and pretty simple to boot.

Hmm, not sure "simple" is how I'd describe it. It's also not a process that has so far lent itself well to automated control. Given the dangers of CO gas, and the constant nannying required to keep it working properly, it's not my favourite idea I must admit. Then again, as far as I know it's the only way to run an IC engine on wood...

Two questions:  Would a IC engine need to have the syngas supplied to it under slight pressure if not what’s needed? A brief concept I just need to understand the process.

No - the engine will suck it in. There is a group who have done a bunch of experiments with woodgas & an old Lister engine - search for Ken Boak, you should find links to the experiments from there. Long & short - yes, it works.

There is a writeup of some of the work that's been done on the lister engine forum as well.

Can't help you with the stirling; I would imagine that building your own would be the best way forward.

[Rob.Wilson]

I THINK  the Swedish built  biomass gasifiers during the 2nd world war  to run there cars. And had it pretty well sussed 


Rob

[PekkaNF]

Finns used wood gas pretty much during the wars. According to this at the end of year 1941 95% buses in Finland used wood gas.

See page 3 abstract:
http://publications.theseus.fi/bitstream/handle/10024/33120/niskanen_mauri.pdf?sequence=1

this seems to bring quite a few usefull google hits:
SOLO STIRLING 161 micro CHP- Module

Pekka

[Swarfing]

You might want to look at pellet stoves as well, some of these use the wood gas.

[Lew_Merrick_PE]

Since you seem to be something of an expert on the subject, would there be a good reason not to build a Savonious Rotor with a horizontal axis?  I think making the support structure could be simplified if oriented that way.

I believe you already figured this one out.

Also, what did you mean by exhausting out the center?  Most designs I've looked at are open to the opposite side in the center (they overlap).  Is that sufficient?

Maybe you can point to some information on an efficient design for one of these?

The thing to understand is that, as the direction of flow is changed by the initial impeller shape, the speed is increased by compression into the center of the alignment.  When it is exhausted "out the other side," you are actually vampiring energy from your torque to feed the combination of temperature drop and expansion (V = nRT/P -- to rewrite the Ideal Gas Law).  This statement applies to a canisterred unit that also protects you from the C_v(air density)(area of impingement)(air velocity²)/2 (where C_v is the Velocity Coefficient of Drag -- approximately = 0.5 for a hemispherical face) drag on the "return" side of your rotor.  In a canister variation of a Savonious rotor, the pressure drop between the inlet and exhaust is the driving energy.  If you return your pressure to ambient, you are losing 50% of your energy.  If you draw it from the (low-pressure/high velocity) center, you gain back a significant portion of those losses.  If you use a NACA-7 aerocurve for your capture geometry you gain (nearly) 15% over a semicircle shape.

Basically, you want to look into aero mass-flow equations and their related geometry in an aeronautical engineering handbook.  The problem is that they are written to protect the high priests of aerodynamics and not to instruct those seeking to learn today.  You need to go back to handbooks & texts written in the 1920's & 1930's to find truly explanatory texts.  The version of Wing Theory Sections that credit Bruno as the author (not the "revised" ones crediting Abbott & von Doenhoff) is quite good.  They were readily available in used technical book stores (at least) into the mid-1970's.

One of my mentors was Maj Gen, Dr. Joseph Black.  One of his statements was that, to really understand a subject, you need to go back before there was a priesthood established to keep the hoi polloi from intruding.  This is one of the best pieces of advice it has ever been my pleasure to receive.

[ieezitin]

Gentlemen

Thanks for a lot of good information. Having the IC engine suck the gas in really is a help.

As to the stirling  it is my intention to make one in fact im ready to make one now but I need to know where I can locate, purchase or copy some plans. I have never made engines so prints would be necessary for me to cut my teeth on.

I don’t want the tea-cup version I envision the full Monty Megawatt Telefunken U47 Model.   

Any Thoughts?

Anthony.