Wind Generators For Home Use - What Homeowners Need to Know About Residential Wind Power

When most people think about the idea of using wind generators for home use, the image that first comes to mind are those rows and rows of giant wind turbines. And for most people, it's this image that causes them to shy away from the possibility of using wind energy themselves.

Fortunately, residential wind power has come a long way in recent years. These advancements in technology have resulted in wind turbines being much smaller in size, as well as multiplying the efficiency of collecting and storing wind power. It's these improvements that have made wind power accessible and feasible to most home owners.

How Do Wind Generators Work?

Wind generators or wind turbines are utilized for a number of factors however the primary reasons would be to produce power in the wind. This might sound challenging but it is feasible. You encounter power in the wind anytime somebody runs past you rapidly.

A second after they pass, you are able to really feel the wind that was produced. This wind which you experienced, if created in large enough quantities, could be converted into power. You might have observed the tall wind turbines standing in the fields whenever you drive by.

There is the older classic design windmill that was used to crush grain when the windmill blades would turn, the blades would turn a mechanism which was attached to some device that would crush grain for flour. You will find a number of various areas which are ideal for generating wind energy and based on where these places are, will depend on how much power is generated.

Building a Wind Generator - Some Tips to Build a Wind Power Generator

Wind generator can be used to capture wind energy, which can be transformed into electricity. There are some basic steps that need to be followed to construct a wind generator. This is an alternative and best way to generate electricity.

Some of the simple steps that need to be followed to build a wind generator includes:

• If the wind generator has to function properly it has to be positioned in such a way, so that it is able to receive maximum winds. So it has to be positioned some 20 feet higher.
• You must also make sure that the place chosen does not include trees that are capable of blocking the direct sunlight.
• Batteries can be used to store the excess electricity produced. Mostly rechargeable batteries are preferred.

Homemade Wind Generators - Tips and Plans to Go the DIY Way

Homemade wind generators are the right solution as an affordable renewable energy source. Building a wind generator may be a daunting task if uninitiated to DIY or lacking technical knowledge, however this can be overcome with a good plan of action and the aid of a wind turbine design.

First of all, it should be found out whether a wind power unit is the right solution for your household electrical energy as opposed to solar power units. To do so, a wind resource assessment can help you decide for a wind turbine.

A wind resource assessment is based on Wind Power Density, which is the annual power available per square meter of turbine area. If you do not have a clue on how to get this information, check out NREL (National Renewable Energy Lab). They have maps for any particular area to help you decide on the feasibility of the project.

Once established that a homemade wind generator suits your purposes, check out ground clearance for mast positioning, as the blades should be as clear of obstacles as they can for optimal efficiency. The higher the blades, the stronger the wind, however a very tall mast requires an exponential amount of materials to build it, making it preferable to construct several smaller and shorter wind generators to contain costs and as a safety back up, should one fail.

Homemade wind generators of 1000 to 3000 watt can cost as little as $150 to $220 and take a weekend for construction. Materials can be purchased at a local hardware store or delivered by mail. The main components of a wind generator are: a steel pipe mast and its rigging, a nacelle (containing the motor), a Dc motor, the blades, a battery bank for the generator and possibly a DC motor analyzer software for maximum efficiency.

The blades can be either purchased or even made cheaply in few hours. Normally they are designed in a 3 blade set up to contain construction costs while providing good conversion of wind power into kinetic power.

To protect the blades and the mast from sudden, strong gusts, the windmill should have a cheap yet effective spring loaded system to allow the blades furling, which means the blades turn their edge to the wind beyond a certain resistance so as to minimize it and avoid breaking.

To allow the windmill to turn the blades facing the wind and get constant power, a simple tail will do the job. There is no need for complicated hydraulics or motor assisted mechanics like in large farm windmills. An important aspect of homemade wind generators is the battery bank to store energy from the generator. These can be found free or cheaply from old fork lift trucks and recycled back into life.

To do so it may be necessary to build also a homemade de-sulfator to pulse the battery back into action. This may seem like a complication, but a bonus point of making a de-sulfator is that these old forklift batteries can be recycled systematically and sold for profit as a stand alone business on top of the electricity savings, not just for the generator.

A DC motor analyzer software should also be complementary to a good wind generator design, providing critical data to optimize efficiency. It all sounds like a lot of hard work to do and it might even be, but it can save you $ thousands over ready made windmills. In fact, homemade wind generators avoid the hefty initial investment of ready made kits that could take a very long time to recover, while saving on electricity bills just as well.

If you do not have idea on how to build homemade wind generators, check out this website. It could save you thousands. Click on homemade wind generators.