power for the back forty

[timberfaller390]

I am building my mill shed in kind of  a out of the way place on my farm and I will need power for the construction and for the lights and a table saw after it is built. I am looking for some kind of permanent power sourse without having to run a gas genarator all the time. any thoughts?

[logwalker]

Lots of solar, big batteries, and a large inverter. Just need lots of money to afford it. joe

[DanG]

That sounds like the ideal spot to build a small methane digester, and install a modified gas genset.

[Radar67]

Or build a gasifier to burn up the scrap wood with.

[TexasTimbers]

Gasifier and a 4000 watt wind generator if you gots a good spot for it. Wind gen would be hassle free and save your wood for the gasifier, for when the wind is lay. Building your own low RPM high volt dc motor is not hard. The magnets, coil wire for your windings, and the free online software to figure your wire size and turns, magnet arrangemnt and the whole nine yards is readily avaialble. You can build  4 to 5 motors in your shop, in your spare time for what a new one costs.

Making your own 6' to 7' wooden, or PVC props is also easy. Your main cost will be a tower and if you start looking now you may have found 1 or 2 by the time you have your generator assembled.

[DanG]

All that is well and good if you just want something to tinker with, but the methane digester will just put out energy, 24/7, rain or shine.  Biggest problem might be finding a use for the excess.

[smoothED]

Is there a stream nearby? A water turbine or waterwheel would make power 24/7. It was one one the things i was looking for on my new property.

[Fla._Deadheader]

  SmoothEd, ever read about the vortex turbine Looks pretty interesting, and a minimal amount of head. 

[smoothED]

I've been reading about everything i could find about water power and how-to's,BUT, i might have to comprimise with my better half and find a place with electric, well and building there already and that gets me out of my price range for a stream.  Now i gotta read everything on wind and solar 

[Fla._Deadheader]

 

i might have to comprimise with my better half and find a place with electric, well and building there already

  That's not a compromise, that's a cave-in. 

[timberfaller390]

I love the water wheel idea but unfortunatly no stream.

[Texas Ranger]

Generac and propane, sell it when your done, or keep it around the house for the coming black and brown outs.

My Generac ran for a little over an hour yesterday when a squall from Eduordo cut the power.

[timberfaller390]

What exactly is a generac and how does it work?

[Radar67]

A generac is an internal combustion engine powered generator. Generac is the brand name.

[Radar67]

the free online software to figure your wire size and turns, magnet arrangemnt and the whole nine yards is readily avaialble.

Point us to this software please. I've seen many of the sites explaining how to build the stators and rotar, but have not seen the windings calculators.

[timberfaller390]

A generac is an internal combustion engine powered generator. Generac is the brand name.

Oh,  thanks I feel a little stupid for not recognizing that. 

Generac and propane, sell it when your done, or keep it around the house for the coming black and brown outs.

My Generac ran for a little over an hour yesterday when a squall from Eduordo cut the power.

I want to stay away from a generator that runs from an engine. Im leaning more toward wind power but I dont know if I have enough wind to do much.
 Texastimbers, is a gasifier going to use wood to produce steam to turn a generator or is it something completely different.

[Texas Ranger]

New roof top wind turbines need a minimum of 12 mph winds to generate the needs of a 48 volt system.  Propane is clean and (relatively) cheap here in Texas, we also have wind turbines, but only the big ones so far.

[Radar67]

A gasifier produces wood gas to run an internal combustion engine. Paul_H has a truck running on wood. See the Wood Burning Truck thread HERE

I am currently gathering the materials to build a gasifier to power a portable electrical generator. I'll be starting a thread on it when I get started.

I've been doing a lot of research on going off grid and one of the conclusions I've come to is...you will have to have some type of generator to produce electricity during slow period of sun and wind if you are strictly solar and wind powered. Building a diverse off grid system is the key to having a truely self sufficient system.

A good reading source for a variety of different systems is www.backwoodssolar.com . They sell components, but also have a lot of useful information to get someone started. Another good read is www.otherpower.com .

[StorminN]

Timberfaller,

The OtherPower site that Radar linked to also has a forum site associated with it, called Fieldlines... I'm sure the guys on the forum could point you in the right direction for software to figure out the windings / magnets, etc.

Fieldlines forum

-Norm.

[TexasTimbers]

DanG it doesn't take as long as you might think. Here's a couple of videos to show you how to put some sewing machine parts and a drill to use, or if you don't want to tinker at all, how to wind a coil on your lathe. Even if you are not making a huge Tesla coild you can use your lathe to make a coil winding.





radar I am looking for the formulas/software links I saved for figuring the poles. i have a WHOLE bunch of favorties under my Soalr/Wind folder. i need to figure out how to be more organized  . . . . . . . yah right.