anyone built any do it yourself windmills or solar panels that work well?

I ran across a website that says it's easy to build your own solar panels and home made windmills. Anyone actually done this?

Reply to
Ashton Crusher
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What the f*ck are you babbling about?

Why don't you post the name of what you are talking about? Better yet, why don't you ask your neighbor's nine year old kid to help you get to google and enter the name of the company and learn how to do the research yourself without asking any more inane pointless questions?

Reply to
AZ Nomad

alt.energy.homepower is a group that would have alot that do this

Reply to
ransley

for windmill you must have a windy unobstructed spot, preferably high on a hill.

my best friend built one in 1960 it has a 14 foot prop, a sophiscated control system that detects faults and shuts it down in say a overspeed condition if the brakes fail. too high a speed can rip it apart, as he once found out when the brakes got covered with ice:(

but it has never produced power in big useful amounts:(

solar panels require a sunny climate, the sunnier the better. their upfront costs are so high they are rarely a good investment, unless you live somewhere like arizonia or southern california.

a solar water heater can provide some return for heating your homes water, to supplement you regular water heater

probably better way to spend money is super insulating your home, with closed cell foam, new windows etc. at least the payback wll be in your lifetime...........

sorry to be a gloomy gus but its just the facts..

Reply to
bob haller

Anyone who would have anything useful to contribute (obviously not you) would know what I'm talking about. I purposely did not put in the web site as I don't want to look like I'm posting one of those fake postings to promote a web site. Are you always an ass hole?

Reply to
Ashton Crusher

Sure. You purposefully made youself out to be a blithering idiot high on weed.

Reply to
AZ Nomad

From everything I've seen and read by the time you buy a bunch of "seconds" solar cells and put them all together in a panel you may as well just buy a panel. Recently I've seen panels advertised for just over $2/watt and there is speculation that they may go even lower in about a year. Keep in mind that this "breakthrough" has be on the verge for a long, long time and hasn't happened yet ;-) There's a recent thread about it on alt energy. homepower (PV Panels $1.98/Watt? vaughn 9/20/09).

As for windmills, as was mentioned you need a spot with really good, consistant wind, a high tower, and probably so many permits that it would never result in a positive gain financially.

I see these as viable options to produce electricity if you live somewhere where the grid is not available. Otherwise it is almost always cheaper to buy it from the electric company.

Reply to
Ulysses

I have this image of the OP using solar panels for windmill blades.

Reply to
AZ Nomad

Not yet... but I am keen to throw an alternator together sometime though, with some blades to drive it. The barn roof's about 40' high, so with a tower atop that it might stand a chance of doing something slightly useful (I'm very skeptical about wind power, but it'd be a fun experiment at least)

Machining blades that are both strong, balanced, and with the right profiles is sure going to be interesting!

Regarding solar, do you mean panels producing electricity, or ones for heating water? The latter should be pretty easy to do, inexpensive, and be capable of doing useful things (even if nothing like 24x7). From what I've read on homebrew PV panels though, it sounds like it's just not worth the effort.

cheers

Jules

Reply to
Jules

There is a scam operation that sells a nearly useless booklet with this in mind. There are also lots of websites with real info, expecially about homemade windmills and solar thermal.

Reply to
Bob F

Electric. Since I'm in the city the windmill is probably a lost cause and it sounds like the solar thing is iffy.

Reply to
Ashton Crusher

*plonk*
Reply to
Ashton Crusher

Yep. The sun lays down 745 watts of energy per sq meter. At noon. On the Equator. On sunny days.

The only way to increase this value is to move the orbit of the earth closer to the sun.

After adjusting for latitude, conversion efficiency, clouds, etc., you might get, at best, 200 watts per sq meter of collector. Plus, accounting for the energy costs to build the equipment, transportation, and installation, the pay-back period is almost forever.

Reply to
HeyBub

Yeah, I suspect you couldn't get enough height to make it really useful (as useful as they can get, anwyay)

Uh huh. Waiting a few years for costs to come down and then buying a commercial panel might be the best bet (I'm sure they'll get cheaper; right now I'm not convinced they save enough over their lifetime to justify the cost)

I keep getting told that domestic heating's the real expense though, so anything simple you can do to minimise that is worthwhile (insulation, lots of south-facing windows etc.)

cheers

Jules

Reply to
Jules

No, he/she didn't. The question was reasonable. You came across as someone who is very unstable with severe emotional issues.

Reply to
Henry

Q> Are you always an ass hole?

A> Sure.

Reply to
Bob Villa

There is a fellow who has posted here in a thread about wood molding who has a very informative site about solar power. He's an interesting guy.

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TDD

Reply to
The Daring Dufas

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