Sun Tracking Steam Generator

 Many moons ago I read an article in the "Mother Earth News" of plans on how
to build a Sun Tracking Steam Generator (STSG).

As I recall the STSG had a motor driven mount which could be corrected to
accurately track the sun by the use of an optical error correction system
(OECS). Fixed plain olde flat mirrors (FPOFM) were set much like a concave
dish only the dish was not (nor need not be) a solid concave surface. The
"dish" need only be in a concave shape either of a grid or mesh (like
chicken wire on braces or grid array of metal strips).

A Solar Boiler (SB) is located at the "dish" focal point so that all of the
FPOFM devices could be focused onto various parts of the SB in order to
heat all of its surface from around the array.

So we have a theoretical STSG which will heat the SB to a temperature
undetermined. Several problems present themselves. IF the boiler is
sufficiently heated to the point of actually super heating the water
inside, how do we tap this source of energy off of the SB on into a nearby
Steam Turbine/Electrical Generator for use in the home and to charge the
Battery Bank (BB) ?

Is this design beyond the capabilities of the average shade tree mechanic
(ASTM) ? Is it feasible to build a "kit" to be sold to the ASTM so that he
/ she will not have to engineer and fabricate it themselves ?

Building a steam turbine / electrical generator would seem to be beyond
most ASTM garage equipment capabilities, although electrical generators
(EG) themselves can be had off the shelf. However building (Engineering,
fabricating, and assembly >>> EFA ) a steam turbine probably is behond the
capability and desire of the ASTM.

You might say "Why not just stick with solar panels and battery banks ?"

Inspite of the engineering difficulties it is hard to compete with
concentrated directed solar energy to develop steam to spin a turbine in
order to turn a generator , in terms of the end Kilo Watts (KW) of power
that you can get from a STSG.

One of the systems,  out west somewhere, uses heliostatic mirrors to track
their directed energy on a fixed SB. This plan uses a tracking array of
fixed mirrors to heat a SB. It is much smaller, designed for home use.

Is it practical ?

How large of a set of  Solar Panels and battery banks would it take to
compare to an equal power output of a STSG of this design ?

Has it already been done on a small scale ? (the Mother earth news plans)


I am not proposing a project so difficult or ridiculous as

"Build Your Own Private Nuclear Power Plant"


Since the sun does not always shine upon our STAGS a Secondary Source
Boiler
(SSA) could be designed to use any other fuel available such as >>>

newspapers, corn cobs, trash, wood, french fry oil, grass clipping, pine
needles, sawdust, leaves, olde pictures of your ex, etc.

Steam from this SSB could easily be routed to Steam Turbine / Electrical
Generator Set (STEGS)

An Auxilary Mechanical Source (AMS) such as an Internal Combustion Engine
(ICE) could also be coupled to the STEGS for emergency power generation
in case you ran out of Sun and pictures of your EX.


Now if I was financially independent and wanted off of the grid I would
build just such a system with multiple sources of energy in a totally
duplicate system. However being a COB I would like to hear it from the
group and just how impractical and unfeasible this plan is. It is not my
plan, it is one that I saw in a Mother Earth News article in the seventies.
I have added to it my ideas of how such a plan could be accomplished.

dave >>> (COB)

Disclaimer >>> I am not currently in any business selling anything. I do
not have an agenda or ax to grind. I am not trying to force my ideas on
anyone. I am a dreamer who desires independence from the power grid and to
conduct my own affairs without interference to anyone.

(COB =  Cheap Olde Bastard )  (also special olympics failed to qulify)


 

      

  Hi;

heyyo@crap.net wrote:


See Teton Engineering Inc's plans:
http://www.redrok.com/main.htm#teton

But why? Satellite dishes are free for the asking.

A number of my customers use my trackers to drive
these things.

See my friends, Virgil Vinz, receiver:
http://www.redrok.com/electron.htm#vdish1

Duane

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okee doke , thanks, Nice site and info

dave (COB) (SOQF)

 

    Of course, a "theoretical" steam turbine (TST) will not run a "real"
electrical generator (REG).

   Seriously, an efficient steam turbine is a complicated device; an
efficient steam plant is far more complicated.  To reach a good efficiency
it needs to have several stages of expansion and must have a condenser to
exhaust into.  You will then need a feed pump to force the water back into
the boiler.   You need controls to regulate the RPM of the turbine and water
levels in the boiler and hotwell.  Even then, every steam plant that I have
been associated with took a full-time human to tend it.  Does anybody make
an affordable household-sized steam turbo-generator system?  I think not.

Vaughn

 

So the answer has to be that this IS BEYOND THE CAPABILITIES OF THE
AVERAGE SHADE TREE MECHANIC.

So I suppose that the current PVC Panels and battery banks are for the
average cave man.

I would like to undertake such projects but lack the facilities and the
fungolas to do so.


Me thinks it would be an interesting research project (IRP) to undertake
another method of Direct Concentraed Solar Energy to Electrical Power
System (DCSETEPS) . At present the current PVC (Photo Voltaic Cell)
Yechnolgy  (CPVCT) does not concentrate the solar energy onto the arrays,
most likely because it would burn out the cells.

What if a PVC could be enginneered to withstand a doubling or tripling of
the directed and concentrated energy to each cell with a resultant increase
in the power output of the panels ?

Also what if we all found the woman of our dreams who wood wait on us hand
and foot and be our continuous sex slaves in the bedroom ... whoops >>>>
off topic.

Anyway as the ASTMs go about reinventing the wheel someday somewhere one
will hit uopon the objective of generating cheap power without a huge
startup cost and set them free from "DA GRID".

DAVE (COB) (SOFTQ)