Superpowerful small wind turbines light up the night
By Nilay Patel 
posted May 13th 2008 4:58PM
posted May 13th 2008 4:58PM
[Thanks, Yocheved]
posted May 13th 2008 4:58PM
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I'd be interested in strapping a couple of those to the roof of an electric car and measuring the benefit of the power generation vs. the deficit created by drag. If the net result is a substantial gain, it could allow EV to travel a lot further on a single charge. Of course, ultimately you wouldn't strap them onto the roof, but work them into dedicated tunnels beneath and to the sides of the car. In any event, this is really cool tech.
Any energy conversion process is going to less than 100% efficient, so for each watt you get out of your car-mounted turbines, you're going to sap more than a watt of power. Therefore, the net result is ALWAYS going to be a loss of power and reduce the distance the EV can travel on a charge. If I were you, I'd spend the money you were going to pay for the turbines on a basic physics textbook.
Ian,
You may well be right, but I wouldn't discount the possibility so soon. I'm sure that air scoops introduce some drag that otherwise wouldn't have been there, yet they allow you to squeeze out a net gain in power by improving the burn of your fuel.
There are definitely ways to make this be a plus to EV efficiency. What if the dedicated tunnels Matt mentioned had shutters on them, giving no difference while accelerating and cruising, but opening up when braking to introduce drag (aiding slightly in braking) and generate a little extra energy? What if there's some magic point where a strong enough headwind will generate more energy than the extra cost of pushing through the extra drag at normal
You missed the whole "physics" thing didn't you? The drag caused by the turbines will use more energy than the energy you will gain. That is BASIC PHYSICS. Period. The laws cannot be changed.
japan has already done the whole, put wind turbines above freeways thing, its not some new great idea. Im not to sure how well theirs works but im sure its useful. the US is just way to far behind on alternative energy sources no matter what the government says.
Can we please do something about these perpetual motion people? I count 5 separate posts in this entry alone proposing some sort of perpetual motion project with these turbines. I propose we send them all back to high school physics, or at least keep them out of public office and prevent them from operating heavy machinery.
Is conservation of energy so hard to understand?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservation_of_energy
I once jetted across the harbor in a bathtub by sticking the shower pipe in the drain so that the water would shoot out the shower head and propel the bathtub.
;-)
@David: Excellent comment! The shutter idea is great. It is best to consider the whole process and not just a piece of it like @thefozz & @Mrbob. Limited thinking = Limited Results. How do you like that equation? Is it conserved enough for you?
Although I wonder what the actual net gain could be.
David: Scoops are generally there to introduce cooler, more condensed air into the intake manifold. It's doing more than just catching air and turning something to generate electricity. So its getting air from inside the engine bay vs from the outside.
This is different. The same energy that would be spinning the turbines on your car is acting as resistance to the car moving itself, equally. If anything it didn't waste energy, it would at best, bring it back to 0 gain/loss.
Although your point about deploying these while braking is a good idea, but you'd have to be really creative to make something like that work and not be completely hideous, and also functional enough to make it worthwhile.
Lol, the idea of applying the turbines only while breaking is good?
Those cars already have regenerative brakes; What good would adding a wind turbine possibly do?
You'll be a lot better off trying to dream up a way of capturing the wind/turbulence created by passing vehicles on the side of a freeway.
Superpowerful small wind turbines light up some guys trainers
"enough juice to blow out a bank of car headlights "like flashbulbs."
is that a normal unit of measure for electrical out put ?
Laptop in the park? Not if it's gonna make my laptop blow like a bank of flashbulbs.
His web page says 13 turbines are 10 times more powerful than one.
Why wouldn't you just use thirteen seperate turbines and get 13 times the power?
You're not quite paying enough attention.
He has thirteen propellers on one shaft with one generator.
Sure, he could use thirteen propellors with one generator each, but that will likely cost between ten and thirteen times as much to assemble.
Why do it the expensive way when this way works great?
Well, if you had enough wind-facing space for 13 single turbines next to each other, you could instead use 13 of these 13-turbine models (assuming you had enough depth available), and again get 10 times the power of your 13 turbine example!
This discounts any extra spacing needed for pivoting to follow wind, of course
Put them in front of an industrial fan and you can get free elecrtic! Hmm wait..
Also:
The skeptic in me looks at these pictures and I see two things...
1. The bend in the central shaft puts the outer blades at increasingly greater and varying angles of attack (all producing inefficiencies).
2. The emphasis on "carbon fiber" makes no sense. You could machine or mold simple plastics into the shapes and use stiffer materials like aluminum for the shaft and save huge amounts of overhead.
Plastic (at least in any makeup I've ever seen) and aluminum are not nearly as strong as Carbon Fiber. At its densest, carbon fiber is about equal to the strength of steel, and weighs considerably less.
there are a lot of aplications for such a devise. This could replace the plastic pigion deterents they have at places like bus and train stations. it could also offset the electricity demands to power the lights.
I bet if he were holding a rod of uranium that long it would do a lot more than blow out some lightbulbs.
Looking for the answer to a question we already know the solution for.
That wind is cheaper than uranium?
Yes, nuclear is a good option, but the general public is scared to death of it despite newer technologies that would make new plants perfectly safe. Wind power is totally clean, and heck, why not explore every possible solution?
I *believe* that they could be used for HELPING to decrease gas consumption. As some said, they could be used only when braking.
Or, I think that they could be used actively while driving, and still result in an increase in efficiency. I think the thing is that it will not be a perpetual motion machine because while it increases the overall efficiency of the engine, It still is not 100% efficient.
It won't be perpetual motion because it's reaping energy from a source. It's just like any other wind turbine. However it will still be very useful, just the wrong word to use in that sentence.
"think the thing is that it will not be a perpetual motion machine"
Will NOT be a perpetual motion machine
Put'em along the roads and highways - make use of the "wind" generated by each passing vehicle.
Its not great idea at all, wind might blow and might not, there is so many mechanical points of failure in-there.., also there is noise and that nasty bird killer problem, add the maintenance overhaul etc. Denmark never replaced any of their coal plants even if they have most wind gen. in the world, because it is so unreliable... wind is not viable, get over it..
No shit, right? It's not meant to replace anything. The point of generating wind power is to ease the amount of natural resources that we would have to use otherwise. I'm sure denmark uses a hell of a lot less coal than they did prior to having those wind farms.
Why are you upset about this? I'm happy about anything that will:
A) Lower the frequency of blackouts in California.
and
B) Lower the frequency of me writing triple-digit checks for my electric bills in California.
20 MPH
that's a lot, that's 8.8 m/s
and my country doesn't have that kind of wind, it goes up to only around 6-7 m/s MAX and avaerage around 4-5 m/s
in Bangkok, it's 2 m/s.
no practical wind power for Thailand.. :(
i'd like to know if his design takes into account wake losses, turbulence etc.
also
they can put them everywhere
if there is unlimited transmission
and people stopped bitching about powerlines being built.
Efficiency for wind turbines goes up the larger they are, small turbines are far less effective. The claim that "The trick is using high-strength carbon-fiber materials that allow several rotors to be hooked up as one" is the biggest load of bs i have read in a long time. I can't emphasize enough how dumb this article is.
Can you emphasize on how dumb you are?
This is a stupid idea. The big advocates here at Endgadget want to attach it to their car for greater efficiency! That should tell you a lot right there.
The pictures make it clear that you need a giant freaking pole to make it useful. What's the advantage over a normal windmill? Maybe it's cheaper to build? Oh, wait... carbon fiber. Scratch that benefit.
You need 20 MPH winds and a huge pole-mounted system to light up 1-3 decent lightbulbs. Put in the compact flourescents and you can raise that up to about 10 decent lightbulbs.
20 MPH winds are not normal in most inhabited places on Earth. So really, you put up the pole, you pay for the carbon fiber, and you get 1-4 free lightbulbs for your home.
It should only take about 500 years to get your investment back.
i like the idea of laptops in the park...by BRINGING BACK the beanie hat with the propeller on top - like a small helicopter - you could power your laptop with this set-up!
Would definitely work in places like "Landscatter", CA, in the pass going to Palm Springs, Ca, and Kansas where wind is almost constant.
dyslexic nerds UNTIE !!!
I think all of the people who want to turbines this to your prius, or other hybrid, do not understand physics/electronics. First of all, as pointed out by several other people, having this on your car will increase drag, and the power it generates will not make up for the lost mileage during driving. Secondly, putting shutters around it to only activate while braking is not going to work either. Hybrids have regenerative brakes with generate electricity while braking, so having turbines doesn't do anything for you. The shutters will generate drag around that area of the car when closed, so you will even lose more mpg when the system is not working due to increased drag. That is why streamlining the car is so important to improve gas mileage.
The only way adding a turbine will work is if it pops up out of the car once you park, so it can generate electricity to charge the battery while the car is sitting in the parking lot/driveway. However, driving around with this extra weight will cause you to lose mpg again. Probably the best solution is to install it in your house, and plug it into your car when you get home. It will then charge the batteries while you sleep for the next day.
The reason I see that as a good idea, is because you don't have to invest in any fancy electronics or apply for any permits from your utility company, since the turbine is not connected to the grid.
These Prius fans need to remember that it's so insanely ugly because it's drag coefficient is one of the lowest of all mass-produced automobiles: 0.26 if I remember. Also, the Prius has no real problems with energy in its battery right now, anyway. It recharges via braking, and it never has more than 60% charge in order to conserve battery longevity.
And only awful people drive them, so let's stop bringing them up, haha.
Haha. Duh. It goes through a regulator and powers a battery. The battery powers everything else.
At the very least it's a great idea for lamp posts.
This was supposed to be a reply to the person joking about it blowing out her laptop.
Again, the amazing Engadget redesign, with it's ever-reliable "reply" function and constantly-shifting graphics/layout strikes.
Attach them to the belts of patrons as they exit Moe's... the flatulence could power their vehicles all the way home!