Make a windturbine from recycled plastics
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fromwastetowind
| Started over 2 years ago
Last update over 2 years ago

Make a windturbine from recycled plastics

The aim is to build a windturbine that is sustainable over its entire lifecycle, and can be released as a professional product. This means that the sourcing of the raw materials, the production process, and the end-of-life windturbine should be done without harmfully impacting the environment.
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7 steps

1

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Design: Match generator and propeller

created over 2 years agoedited over 2 years ago
The first step is the hardest. This is the design of the blades, and to find a generator that fits it (or the other way). We designed our blades in QBlade, which is completely open-source and can be downloaded here: http://www.q-blade.org/ To match both, the powercurve of the generator needs to cross the powercurve of the propeller through the top at each windspeed. Otherwise the propeller will overspeed, or stall. For now, we choose to focus on the build of Horizontal Axis WindTurbines (HAWT). Later on we will build a Vertical Axis Windturbine (VAWT). For our prototypes, we will buy an axial flux generator from a trusted Chinese manufacturer. This will be the TGET260-0.5kW-500R, but we don't recommend it because the quality is only average. The nuts to secure the hub on the axle, that came with it where even very skewed and we had to find new ones. There is also totally no recognition or openess from TGET to fix an issue.

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Raw materials: choose wise!

created over 2 years ago
We are choosing for pure plastic blades because of the waste problem that fiber-reinforced blades pose. After the lifespan of 20 years, the blades of a windturbine are grinded down for use in asphalt, or are buried in huge landfills. So to make a true circular product, the windturbine's materials should be reusable when it is end-of-life in a similar application. Preferably, the used materials should also be locally available. Because when waste is shipped to far away countries with less stringent environmental regulations, the plastics often end-up in the environment. PET is a good example since it's used in the food packaging a lot, and has good mechanical properties. Second on our list come ASA and PMMA which are a bit better but are harder to find. Another environmental burden is mining for metals used in the generator. Most of the time, neodymium (NdFeB) magnets and copper are the main ingredients, next to a shaft of steel. Based on a lot of good results in the DIY-community, and the work of Hugh Piggot, we will go with ferrite magnets that are also less prone to rust than the NdFeb-magnets. Furthermore, we will make the housing for the rotor (which is holding the magnets) and the stator (holding the copper coils) from plastic. For now, we have had good results with 3D-printing the blades. More about that in the next update!

3

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Print the blades and hub

created over 2 years agoedited over 2 years ago
We converted a 200EUR household 3D-printer so it can print blades of 1m, more about it on the How-To: https://community.preciousplastic.com/how-to/xl-long-bed-3d-printer-conversion We're using SuperSlicer because it has the best thin-edge control, which is important for the leading edge of the blade. It also allows to use multiple infills in one object. - 5mm wall thickness - spar of 1cm: 100%infill - above the spar: 5% gyroid infill - under the spar: 18% gyroid infill - (todo:upload gcode and SuperSlicer 3mf project) Sandwich the blades between both hub parts with bolts of 10mm diameter.

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Balance the propeller

created over 2 years ago
Once everything is bolted together, it's necessary to balance it out to prevent vibrations in the windturbine. We have put some extra nuts on the side of the propeller that is tilted upwards because it's lighter.

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Good siting is half the work!

created over 2 years ago
The wind power increases with the cube of the wind speed. In other words: doubling the wind speed gives eight times the wind power. Therefore, the selection of a windy location with clean, laminar airflow is very important for a wind turbine. Below you can see some siting rule of thumbs. Also, good observation in the first weeks of the windturbine's installation is good practice!

6

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Safety measures!

created over 2 years ago
One of the ways to protect the windturbine from being damaged by storms is turning it out of the wind. A very simple way to do is, is called 'furling'. We choose for vertical furling, which works by letting the windturbine rotate around a horizontal axis. The harder the wind blows, the more it pushes the windturbine out of the wind. For now, we designed a tail that we will print in ASA the coming weeks. So keep posted!

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Battery charging

created over 2 years ago
The windturbine can reach a max voltage of 48V, so is not suitable for grid tie. Luckely a lot of off-grid situations are suitable as they run on batteries. We are working on an open-source MPPT- windturbinecontroller and batterycharger. This will be based on the work of PhilippeDC: https://www.hackster.io/philippedc/a-wind-turbine-mppt-regulator-with-an-arduino-uno-783462 This will also incorporate 3 relays that short-circuit each phase that will prevent the windturbine from spinning, but is still to be tested.
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