Car (or bike) Chat!

[Pigmy Pony]

I have been looking at a small helix sail driven turbine, only 1.3m tall, it will start to generate power with wind speed as low as 8mph and will continue to do so in a light breeze, it outputs 1-4kwh, so over 24 hours at 1kwh it would easily be enough to run our entire house. They are £1200 plus fitting, we are considering as a additional feed to our batteries in the winter primarily.

Is this the sort of thing you're considering? As a normal solar pv set up outputs 4kW (max permissible in a domestic setting I think) the cost/benefit ratio of your idea stacks nicely. And a lot less of an eyesore than solar panels. It'll be interesting to see how you get on.

[AJSki2fly]

Is this the sort of thing you're considering? As a normal solar pv set up outputs 4kW (max permissible in a domestic setting I think) the cost/benefit ratio of your idea stacks nicely. And a lot less of an eyesore than solar panels. It'll be interesting to see how you get on.

Hi Steve

No I found this one, Test ATLASX 430mm diameter by 1180mm tall, I originally found a helix based one but these seem to have a better spec, TESUP turbinse are used by the military so are pretty robust. They also do an Atlas 2.0 3 blade model but a 1m by 1.1m. There is a huge variety of Wind Turbines out there, I am not clear as to what type is the best in terms of efficiency, all I know is the propeller type tend to be noisier, the helix designs can be very efficient and quiet, as can the one I like, the type of generator and the quality of the bearings used also has a big impact. Wind turbines are not that complex in reality, basically you could take a simple generator mount it and put a blade on it and wait for the wind to turn it, there are various DIYers out there who have doe this sort of thing, nut I doubt many will be very efficient.

https://www.tesup.co.uk/product-page...enerator-house



Unless you live on top of a windy hill you probably want to check out the amount of wind you get over the winter months with one of these https://www.weathershop.co.uk/5-in-1...el-description There is some very good statistical wind data out there on the net for local areas, but you need to be aware there the wind power you get can vary greatly by what is around you, we all know the effect of walking around a building in a city and nearly getting blown over(because it is vortexing and accerating) and then you go around the next corner and its dead calm.

I have been told that you should position the anemometer at the centre point of where the blades of the wind turbine would be mounted and take measurements, and experiment with positions until you find the best practical spot. Having done so it is best to take measurements over the period you want to generate electricity to determine if it will meet you needs. If you are going to rely on it on a daily basis to top the batteries or run the house then you may be disappointed, but in a reasonably good site then there if you use it with batteries to store excess then you likely to get a high success.

As I said previously I am mainly looking at it to supplement the Solar PV throughout the winter months, realistically it may achieve 60-80% electric power needs through the winter, there will be days with no or very low wind. About 2/3 of the year our electricity needs are fully met by the Solar PV, the remaining 1/3 mid November through to mid March is our highest grid usage, around 2500-3000Kwh, which is £1100(inc VAT) at 35p/kwh. Based on what we have seen so far with the Solar and looking at UK Solar data for our are we should still generate 5-10kwh/day from the Solar PV, so being cautious we will take 7Kwh over 120 days which is 840Kwh. This means we need about 2200kwh from the Wind Turbine, or on average 18kwh/day, I think over a 24 hour period with a fair wind this is achievable, there will be dead calm days obviously but one would hope this would also be sunny days. I reckon that realistically we may end up having to pay for around 600-800Kwh of electricity through the winter, so I am hopeful the bill over the 4 month period would be £220-290 at 35p/kwh. If I am right then the Wind Turbine is paid back for in electric bill saving in less than 2 years. I am reasonably confident in this based on what I hoped for with the Solar PV/battery installation and what we are getting to date, it is within +-5% depending on Solar conditions.

Getting totally off grid is very difficult to achieve, there are some who have done so locally but generally they are farmers who do not have planning restrictions and can invest more. I think that as technology improves and equipment and batteries become more efficient then cost effectiveness and

[Macca]

That looks good and I'm pretty sure would cover almost all my power needs, calm days are very rare here. Would pay for itself in two years, less once leccy prices go up again in October. Just a shame I would not get planning consent for it.

[dave2010]

Back to the Hybrid or not to hybrid discussion earlier.

An interesting article from someone who is probably closer to what is going on than me, and probably more articulate on the subject.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/el...brid-cars.html

One problem with this "debate" is that the manufacturers and marketeers deliberately (I think) use the word "hybrid" so that the public think that all hybrid cars are environmentally friendly. While that may be true in the sense that a hybrid car - which combines an ICE with motor/generators is possibly better than a pure ICE car, it muddies the waters substantially. Hence we now see adverts for "self charging hybrids" - a diabolical way to try to bamboozle people.

OTOH plug-in hybrids may offer the best of both worlds, or the worst of both worlds, depending on your point of view. For city dwellers probably using a car is something they shouldn't do anyway - at least in the UK, though in other countries there may not be a viable option. For suburbanites, or people who do many short journeys, but occasional long trips, then a plug-in hybrid covers the bases - though does so with extra weight - the weight of the battery and electric motors if running on petrol/diesel, or the weight of the engine if running on fuel - and that isn't a great thing.

However currently pure EVs do have limited range compared to ICE cars - a small ICE probably has a range comparable to the better EVs, while hardly any EVs can do really long trips without recharging.

Looking at energy problems on a country wide basis, vehicles are important, but not necessarily more so than other aspects of consumption. Home insulation and switching to heat pumps - if possible [which it often isn't] may be better things to concentrate on, as well as generally more effective use of energy - say for industry and commerce.

If every car owner switched to electric vehicles right now, I doubt that the electricity grid would cope - and even with planned ramping up of electricity generation and distribution, it might take 100 years before a viable infrastructure could satisfy demand. Also, for larger vehicles, there may still be a need to have petrol or diesel trucks and lorries. Note however that Ford is now supplying an EV pickup truck, which will help one section of the market.

It is good that some people are switching to EVs - and hopefully over time there will be wider acceptance, though consumer inertia is considerable.

[struth]

i had a self charge hybrid from toyota. car certainly got better mileage than a normal ice car of same size and power. in summer i could easily get 62mpg and still have a bit of performance. THe sch nissans are only really powering the start stop mechinism and are just called that to look like they are helping the planet. At least mine could drive pure electric(not far but it would get you out of the estate etc but slowly) lol

[struth]

If your driving local most of time then an ev is the job you want. I know of a few folk who only go a really long trip a couple of times a year so with savings they make with the ev hire a big ice for the trips away. a fancy merc etc.

[Macca]

Taxis and home delivery vans seem to be going electric quite rapidly which makes a lot of sense given their use-case. Plus most of them were diesel previously which is the worst of all worlds for noise and pollution.

[struth]

Taxis and home delivery vans seem to be going electric quite rapidly which makes a lot of sense given their use-case. Plus most of them were diesel previously which is the worst of all worlds for noise and pollution.

one of the dpd drivers that comes to me has an escort sized van thats an ev. he says its hopeless and he almost never makes it home without having to sit with it charging somewhere. range is woeful

[Macca]

one of the dpd drivers that comes to me has an escort sized van thats an ev. he says its hopeless and he almost never makes it home without having to sit with it charging somewhere. range is woeful

The Amazon van is in my street most days, that's a Merc I think, about the size of an LWB Transit, and is all-electric.

next time I get a delivery I'll ask him about it.

[dave2010]

quite a few up here. Only few big ones, but lots of small and tiny ones. little ones for hamlets and small for villages etc. probaby the best form in highlands as they can be hidden pretty well

I spotted a big one yesterday - which is probably an outlier on a nearby wind farm. Normally it's not visible because of angles, and trees etc., so I was a bit surprised to notice it. There are a few small ones on farms etc., though I'm not sure how useful they are.

Here is an interesting article: https://www.clean-energy-ideas.com/w...urbine-produce

If the one I spotted is big enough - which it may be - owned by SSE most probably - it could easily supply the whole of the village and a few others round where we live. Given that there are many nearby - though not terribly visible except from a few low spots or from the air, and there is also hydro power then the local area should be at least a modest generating "hub".

There is some benefit to the local community as the electricity company is required to provide some advantages - though in what form? In previous years they refurbished the village hall - though the joke is that having fitted heat pumps to replace oil heating, the bills went up - or so I heard!