Hill Farm Cottage...

[adrian]

Roger here goes...





There is also a ground source heat pump, the Cornish made one, though no piccies, need to get the key and am babysitting at moment....can post later...

Off to the council today to chat about a wind turbine, would like one, they quite happy as long as no-one can see it and I prefer no noise so if poss a VAWT one...if i can find one i like.....

EDF adn Good Energy having heart failure at the moment as the normal elec meter, as in elec used, runs backwards...... ....app need a stop circuit, they coming out in a week or so, though amusing to watch spin back and forth depending on day or night.....

Am in a very windy location on a hill by the south coast, so have to be careful which wind turbine to add......luckily neighbour is slightly deaf anyway as he the farmer and cool about a wind turbine as long as it does not disturb his cows......

Wind turbine would be a bonus as SO windy here, very high average m/s, though swirling wind due to valley nature of location.

Any ideas for a decent quiet VAWT?

[martin]

personally not a VAWT fan at all (pun!) - I'd go for a Futurenergy, poissibly a Miniwind, or if funds allow, a 2.5 or 6kw Proven

[CeeBee]

Hi Adrian - good looking stuff.

The Resol pumpstation and controller look the same as mine.

Just looked at your previous posts, and see you were doing the PV in 2006 - asking about ROCs and export. So where did you end up with that? I have a 2.1kWp PV system myself. As someone else with an existing PV system, and possibly and export deal in place with one of the electricity companies, I wonder if you've seen our discussion on the consultation docs for feed-in tariffs (they're over in Feed In Tariffs). The proposed rates for existing systems aren't all that hot - I think I'll be commenting to DECC that maybe we deserve something better, considering all the hassles we've been through trying to deal with the present system.

Both my thermal and PV are somewhere here in Show us Yours, and I do real-time graphs of the PV (not from the Fronius inverter, but by counting LED flashes on the meters).

[dhaslam]

Very impressive.  You will have to make your house bigger if you want to fit anything else on the roof.

I am in the process of doing some experimentation with VAWTs. The two things I like is the ease of maintenance with all the electrics near the ground and the possibility of using  flaps to control wind speed and generate power nearly all of the time.    The flaps would be controlled using a stepper motor linked to wind speed.     This video shows  something similar but it's size is far too small and the flaps are  hand adjusted.    I think the materials cost will be something like €3,000 but the inverter will cost as much again. .   
 
www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRXRUFrxKAQ

[adrian]

Well, thanks for the replies, I have only just commissioned the system after a few niggles. I am with Good Energy for the generation side of it, think they pay 20p a kW/h, will find out in the morning when the contract arrives.  They retiring ROC's anyway, (GoodEnergy) so need to find out more......

The FIT / ROC consultation needs a lot of investigation adn I will look into your link then quiz Good Energy. They very helpful and not a call centre, you actually get to speak to a real knowledgeable person...
 
Will report back.....

As for wind turbines, I like the look of the VWATS, as they take up less space, though I would need a serious tower to hold one up with the wind here and have to decide if it is worth the cost.  The towers are more than the turbines and windyboys!

Also I need to add a full logging system for the Fronius IG30 (and Resol if poss) to send data to a website to record all data realtime.  I asked before though got waylaid with the move and other stuff....

[Richard Owen]

Applaud worthy stuff

[dhaslam]

As for wind turbines, I like the look of the VWATS, as they take up less space, though I would need a serious tower to hold one up with the wind here and have to decide if it is worth the cost.  The towers are more than the turbines and windyboys!

I wouldn't worry about a VAWT being  near the ground.    My wind meter is about two metres off the ground which about where the bottom of the VAWT will go.  If the meter is showing enough wind then the turbine should be OK.   

[Pip]

That looks really nice. [Applaud]

Bet you have a bit of hole in your wallet with all those PVs  . 

Out of interest, what are the solar thermal units?

Cheers
Pip

[adrian]

The thermal units are Zen solar ones, the contractor who put in the solar collectors could have lagged the pipes better, am loosing heat all over the place, so am currently shoring that up.

though after discovering i can change the factory setting to higher than 60degree max, have set now to 75degree, the water stays hotter longer.  I have no backup boiler, so was/am considering a wind turbine to power a 48v immersion heater and grid tie it at the same time if poss; with a switch...need heat in winter switch on immersion, otherwise feed to grid....

[ecogeorge]

Anyone else spot the solar collector showing 107 c 
But hats off to you , nice install.
George.

[adrian]

Anyone else spot the solar collector showing 107 c 
But hats off to you , nice install.
George.

Yup, been wondering about that, goes from 105 to 121, depending on sun, though the manual says the safety cut-off is 145!  whole roof is south facing.....and pitched for maximum efficiency....it not meant that temp?...thought as system under pressure plus filled with some anti freeze thingy could not boil?

[CeeBee]

Yup, been wondering about that, goes from 105 to 121, depending on sun, though the manual says the safety cut-off is 145!  whole roof is south facing.....and pitched for maximum efficiency....it not meant that temp?...thought as system under pressure plus filled with some anti freeze thingy could not boil?

I think we're wondering not so much whether it will boil but what it's doing quite so high. Normally the temperature of fluid coming from the panel just 'tracks' the temperature of the water in the cylinder, but a number of degrees higher (say 10 or 20) - an equilibrium is reached where the temperature difference is such that the power produced in the panel is balanced by the transfer in the solar coil. So - with pump running - I'd only expect the collector sensor to read 107 if the store sensor was e.g. 87 to 97 (which I bet it's not).

Is the pump running, or is this the scenario whether the cylinder has reached its set maximum (which I think you recently figured how to change from 60 on the Resol controller) so the pump has stopped, and the panel is just heating without the energy being taken away? Or could the collector sensor maybe be measuring something other than the actual circulating fluid e.g. some part of the panel structure which gets hot just like things left in the sun do?

[dhaslam]

The reason for the high panel temperature is the pump switching off  at 75C.   The panel area does seem to be very large.      It would be good to have a separate storage facility  to store up the spare heat for dull days.

[adrian]

Aha, got you.....yes, the temp only hits the 100's once the storage tank is up to temp, and then the pump switches off.......it hit 107 c yesterday morning as the tank was up to temp very quick due to the very hot weather in the morning......

And yes good idea for a separate storage area for dull days......though even on dull ones i seem to have hot water at the moment...have not had a full winter in yet........we will see.....hence why a 48v wind turbine for the immersion heater would be good, if the economics work......if only thermocouples to tke the heat and convert to Watts were available to attach to the panels once tank temp is reached.....

[EccentricAnomaly]

.....hence why a 48v wind turbine for the immersion heater would be good, if the economics work......

It might also be worth thinking about the economics of a smaller wind turbine driving an air or water source heat pump.