Design Considerations for Wind Turbine Capacity:

There are a lot of things to consider when setting up homemade wind turbines. One of the most important ones is wind turbine capacity. Or in simpler terms: how to squeeze every possible energy from the wind. Here are some of the design considerations when building one’s own system.

HAWT or VAWT

One of the things to consider when building a homemade wind turbine is whether to use the schematic for the Vertical Axis Wind Turbine or to use the one for the Horizontal Axis Wind Turbine. Both wind turbines are effective and have some positive points to them. For the VAWTs design, the main rotor shaft is set vertically. This setup can be very advantageous because the gearbox and even the generator itself can be placed close to the ground. This results in very easy maintenance of the device. Also, since the VAWT design does not implement windmill like rotor blades, it can be considered relatively safe, especially in serious cases of very strong gusts and storms. Another good advantage of the VAWT is that it does not need to be pointed against the winds direction to harness its kinetic energy.

The Horizontal Axis Wind Turbine on the other hand, has a quite different schematic. Unlike that of the VAWT, the HAWT gearbox and generator is located on the top of the turbine. It usually has two or more rotor blades and it is considered to be one of the most efficient systems available for getting as much from wind energy. Since it makes use of aerodynamic rotor blades, the sweep area for the HAWT is relatively bigger and more power is therefore generated. Aside from that, the HAWT has a very common and simple design. The HAWT needs to be properly pointed at the wind direction to harness the most energy.

SIZE MATTERS

When designing homemade wind turbines, size can be a design consideration. This is typically significant to get more power out of the system. How much power does the system have to generate?  One thing to consider about wind turbines is that the sweep area of a turbine or the encompassing area where the rotor blades move is directly proportional to the output energy. Bigger is better so to speak. Designing a wind turbine with a big rotor blade will most likely generate more power. However, building a wind turbine with really big rotor blades can be a problem unto itself. There’s a big possibility of the equipment being a safety hazard when things suddenly go wrong. Choosing the best size for the system is not only of practical importance but health and potential risks have to be included into the computation as well.

MATERIALS USED

Homemade wind turbines come in all shapes and sizes. There have been a lot of builders who’ve designed their systems with unusual materials like cardboard boxes, scrap metal and the like. This makes for novelty designs. However, for practical reasons, it would be best to consider high quality materials – especially since the wind turbine is designed to be used on a day to day basis and will be exposed to all of nature’s elements.

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