two new hydro projects

 My hydro rep is getting around -- which is scary considering how little I
really know about it.  But what the hell right?  

Anyway my nighbour Wes on Langlois Mountain just put in a 3 inch gravity
fed line for irrigation etc on his place and he wants to run a turbine to
light a small cabin and to keep his electric fences charged in the
winter.

get this he says he's got 100 PSI at one point in his line.  The pressure
is so high he's building some holding ponds half way down so he won't
blow his pipe up.

So I was creaming my jeans hearing that news.  Doing some numbers he's
got 1-1.5k watts even using a very inefficient turbine/alternator setup
..

the annoying thing is that he doesn't need all that power -- he just
needs to keep an electric fence battery charged and run a few lights in a
camping cabin (used for elk hunting etc)once in a while.

So probably less than 200 watts would do him just fine (he could even
keep that fence going with 50 probably.  Those solar powered electric
fence pannels are pathetic small and they seem to work) -- he's still
setting things up but we're going to do a half-assed home brew setup for
him.  I told him we'll make a shit system for cheap and then if he ever
needs more power he can upgrade.  We'll also have to keep a moderate dump
load that way .. although i want to puke knowing all that juice potential
won't be used.  He's no where near real power so we can't do grid tie up
there.. if only he and I  could swap streams!!

I told him to do an energy audit and find out what he's using now and
we'll shoot for a bit above that to get started.  

the other thing I got this 'water star' tow behind your sailboat PMA for
dirt cheap with prop that folk use to keep the batteries topped up when
they're out on the ocean.  I'm thinking about running it in my big creek
or my stream when water is high to get a little extra boost. I just got
it -- running some bench tests now.  Seems to want pretty high RPM to get
to 12 volts so i might just use it for the langlois mountain turbine/w
pelton wheel.

Gonna go down to the creek and see if I can find a spot where it might
work .. dubous without a very fast flow.  Mid summer the ol creek is
pretty low.

anyway .. pretty jazzed about playing with 100 psi .. we'll have to cut
that down quite a bit and maybe build a plastic bucket turbine for his
needs.  Depends on how much ol Wes wants to spend.  Man if I had that I'd
be loving it

cheers

-zachary

 

z wrote:


Nice when you've got the land area, geography and rainfall to do it.

Graham


due to the hugely increased level of spam please make the obvious adjustment
to my email address

 

Wet dreams eh?


Looks like you are gonna have to change your handle for "z" to "h" for
Hydroman!

 
 Maybe " Z_the_H "  ?  Back to the original post. That is how folks get rich
and hated in the USA. They have an idea, put that idea into practical use,
other folks see the results and want some of it for themselves, they get you
to work your magic and the word spreads, you can't service all the requests,
you have to hire help and charge for your magic, et voila, you are rich and
hated.

 Good for you "Z". Looks like you have started down the road to helping
folks out "just because you can".

--


Don Thompson

Stolen from Dan:  "Just thinking, besides, I watched 2 dogs mating once,
and that makes me an expert. "

There is nothing more frightening than active ignorance.
~Goethe

It is a worthy thing to fight for one's freedom;
it is another sight finer to fight for another man's.
~Mark Twain

 

aww shucks.  Thats nice to hear but he's a neighbor .. next mountain
over.  Also when I ask him where the elk herd is near his place he'll
tell me for sure ;)

Also who wouldn't want to play with 100 psi 3 inch .. thats a wet dream

pun intended ha hah