Building a wind turbine tower

[green69rt]

Neat video, even if it is an advertisement.


https://www.youtube.com/embed/84BeVq2Jm88?feature=player_detailpage

[Lennard]

 

[ws23rt]

  also.  I like mechanical stuff and these things are aesthetically pleasing in many ways.  (But do change the landscape when there are hundreds).

It's too bad that most of them (at least when I researched their life span) are/were specified for efficiency ---the transmissions were made light to meet that specification.  The down side is they would not last long enough to pay for the transmission replacement cost when needed.  

This is a sad way to embark on a great idea.  ---Maybe that issue has been addressed with the current ones going up instead of just taking tax money to make up the difference as usual?

[John_Kunkel]

Here's a treatise on gearbox failures:

http://machinedesign.com/mechanical-drives/fixing-wind-turbine-gearbox-problems

[ws23rt]

Here's a treatise on gearbox failures:

http://machinedesign.com/mechanical-drives/fixing-wind-turbine-gearbox-problems

Thanks for that John

[J.Bond]

Neat video, even if it is an advertisement.


https://www.youtube.com/embed/84BeVq2Jm88?feature=player_detailpage

Neat..... I don't think so!!!!!!

What you guys are watching in that video, I can see from my front window, back window, side window and almost from every window in my home. 1997 when I bought my home, there were no wind turbines what so ever. At this point a couple of hundred for sure. Don't get me wrong, I get it, I would rather have wind turbines than nuclear generators, how ever, the politics behind the governing body has made it impossible to even deal with. Right off the hop, why isn't Ontario Hydro involved, why is it, most of these wind farms are owned by non Canadian companies? I cannot wait, well maybe I can, to see what happens to all this equipment in 20 years. The contracts are based on 20 year periods, at this point ,no one can tell me for sure, who is responsible at the twenty year mark, will the owners of said turbines, remove what's left, will the inherent bad design even last 20 years. It just seems to be a free for all for anything labeled alternative energy......

Sorry for the rant, They are starting to install another 18 mills, a transformer station, one consession line south of me and about 30 miles of buried high voltage under ground cable right in my vicinity..... ions for everybody.

[ws23rt]

It's odd how priorities move with the wind (so to speak).  In the Columbia river gorge (in the eighties I think?) a home owner was forced to tear down his newly and legally built home because it interrupted the view.  Now  wind turbines dot the landscape.

[Ghoste]

And when they are in a pack like that, they are noisy too.  The red flashing lights everywhere at night isn't all that attractive either.  But I imagine the kids coming online now will never know anything different so it wont matter.  Kind of like billboards 80 years ago.

[Steve P.]

I understand the worry and the downside of wind turbines, but I also remember the smog of the 60's - 70's. I damn sure want wind turbines over that nasty crap any day!! And I use to rebuild power plants. I can tell you they are one nasty nightmare.. One right after the next and nothing but toxic disaster from every one of them... I'll take wind mills and solar power any time over all that crap....

Now we need to get serious about battery banks....

[Ghoste]

I know what youre saying too.  But all of those things also seem to be okay with everyone who doesn't live beside them.  (whether its a wind turbine power plant nuclear facility whatever)

[ws23rt]

I understand the worry and the downside of wind turbines, but I also remember the smog of the 60's - 70's. I damn sure want wind turbines over that nasty crap any day!! And I use to rebuild power plants. I can tell you they are one nasty nightmare.. One right after the next and nothing but toxic disaster from every one of them... I'll take wind mills and solar power any time over all that crap....

Now we need to get serious about battery banks....

I couldn't agree with you more  I to used to and still do build and rebuild power plants. I've worked on coal, nuke, and natural gas plants.
Their are risks and hazards in all of them as well as the other industrial plants I work in.--Papermaking, steelmaking, etc.

From an early age I looked forward to improvement in batteries. Much has happened and much will come.

We need to consider that to carry a large amount of energy (as we need in a car for example) there are risks and hazards that are part of what we are doing.  Those risks and hazards are not only in the battery but the industry that makes them and the industry that recycles them. I expect that those issues can and will be dealt with but only to a degree of safety. Their will always be risk.

An example I like to refer to is a flywheel for power.  It is just a heavy wheel but when one spins it up it becomes an energy storage device. It now is a very real hazard as well as a source of power.  My point is that the power it's self is the real bottom line hazard/risk. 

Another relevant part of this topic is the power to fill the batteries has to come from somewhere.

[Steve P.]

I agree Ghoste. I don't think I would be happy with my nice quiet country land and home being disrupted by windmills. But we have to face the reality of what we are doing to the environment also... Every time we make a change someone isn't going to like it. The fact is, we have to do something and right now the best answer is solar and wind. It's going to take some time to get it all right, just as it has for everything else, but what they are working on today is BY FAR better than anything of the past... WS23RT and I can tell you horror stories, I guarantee you.. I have never spoken with WS23RT before about work, but there is no way he has worked in this field and NOT seen and know about the disastrous downside that nobody ever hears about.. We just suit up the best we can and work as diligently as possible. Fly ash comes immmmmediatly to mind along with leaky pumps at the nuke sites. Then look at the garbage burners.. The EPA has done a pretty good job making them filter, but still the numbers of ALLOWABLE PPM of carcinogens is crazy.....

Yes, I like windmills.....  

[ws23rt]

I agree Ghoste. I don't think I would be happy with my nice quiet country land and home being disrupted by windmills. But we have to face the reality of what we are doing to the environment also... Every time we make a change someone isn't going to like it. The fact is, we have to do something and right now the best answer is solar and wind. It's going to take some time to get it all right, just as it has for everything else, but what they are working on today is BY FAR better than anything of the past... WS23RT and I can tell you horror stories, I guarantee you.. I have never spoken with WS23RT before about work, but there is no way he has worked in this field and NOT seen and know about the disastrous downside that nobody ever hears about.. We just suit up the best we can and work as diligently as possible. Fly ash comes immmmmediatly to mind along with leaky pumps at the nuke sites. Then look at the garbage burners.. The EPA has done a pretty good job making them filter, but still the numbers of ALLOWABLE PPM of carcinogens is crazy.....

Yes, I like windmills.....  

[JB400]

Only problem I have with wind energy is you're still stuck paying for electricity to some company.  I think the best way would to go solar.  Put the panels on your roof, batteries and charge controller in the attic, and your done, unless you're North of the Artic Circle, then you're screwed for half the year.  Your only limitation is battery life, and that keeps improving every other year or so.  Tesla has helped that out quite a bit.  Once their gigafactory is up and running, and Tesla becomes more than just a luxury car, lithium ion batteries should drop in price.

[J.Bond]

Well we have come a long way since the 60's and70's, I was there. There were no environmental protection practices in place. I think I would say , I remember the commercial with the native American Indian standing at the side of the road on a bridge cloverleaf looking down at a pile of cigarette butts with a tear in his eye. Like I said earlier, I get it. However, lets just say the political agenda set out by the powers to be, do not all ways work out at the end of the day. A better way to look at, it's like mechanical engineers, they can draw a perfect A..hole all day long, I would like to see them make it work....our last premiere started two new generating plants that were never completed and scrapped, at a staggering cost to our province. The way the wind turbine industry hit this neighborhood was back handed, They went after all the farm lots that no longer had homes or residents, an easy sell. Then who ever else signed up, a procedure that really broke up the neighbourhood, and pitted neighbour against neighbour. Who would have thought 20 years ago That I would be yelling at my next door neighbour, and for what, something imported into our region by greed.......Any way, had they bought up enough land and centrally located these mills without jamming the residential region,I do not think there would be as many upset land owners like myself.

Just in case of confussion, what did this green energy cost me. This was my dream retirement property, I was going to live my life out here.
Lori and I were going to actually going to be wed here next year. The plan is at this point sell the property, at a loss, move, and start over.

[Steve P.]

I have never visited any of these mill sites, but have seen many pictures and I guess I just don't understand the issue.. Is it the change in the landscape? The sound? Both? Something else? I don't understand why this land cannot still be farmed or full of cattle. I think there are options or at least should be!

In Texas there is an oil man who has gone to wind power. His land that was once covered in oil rigs everywhere, is now covered in windmills.. Of course he made money on both, but he is also pretty proud to be making power that doesn't harm the environment.

Most of the high tension lines here in Floriduh are above ground. They are very unsightly and are everywhere. The amount of property they take up is insane, but they say necessary. These power line trails are free of trees and have to be mowed all the time as they like to attract lightning and the ground underneath will lite on fire quickly otherwise. I'd like to know why these lines are not buried and the land above used for solar AND wind?? Floriduh IS the SUNSHINE STATE and we always have a breeze at night. This cross breeze is what brings us thunderstorms most summer days and the amount of rain we get. I would damn sure rather see these clean linear mills with solar panels traveling the same thousands of miles the high tension lines are following now.... They have been saying for years that all these power lines are old and need to be changed, so why not do it all at once?

Here's the answer to that. As I said earlier, we have great breezes here and "we don't create pollution here". Well, according to a past governor at least!! We do not even have smog tests here anymore.  Like China doesn't make smog because they SAY they don't.. So the cost ~V~ intake here is better than finding GOLD. Still, we pay some of the highest electric in the country. I think as they build better mills and solar panels and figure out a way to build great storage banks, the cost will come down and we'll see more companies invest. But until it becomes cost worthy for them, they will fight to frack and not give pollution a second thought.

[JB400]

 Your complaint about the power lines is the same reason why Florida doesn't have windmills all over the place.  If I remember correctly, FL has a lot of income off of the tourist industry, and no one wants to travel there just to end up seeing a bunch of windmills.  I think most of the coastline is protected waters, so you can't put them out in the ocean either.  Your oilman probably lives 75 miles from the nearest town, therefore there would be little argument for having a wind farm.

[Steve P.]

I disagree with some of that, JB. Most of the power lines look like highways from the air. They do run through some neighborhoods of course, but the difference between seeing these enormous steel erections every thousand feet or so verses seeing windmills would be a no brainer if left to the people.. Also something that many fought was CELL TOWERS, but you see them everywhere and people don't bitch as long as they don't have dropped calls....

There is give and take to most everything. We have to listen to the constant hum from these high voltage lines, so why not trade that for something that we all know is close to 100% better for the World than the crap that is there now?? Add to that the solar panels that you would ONLY see from the sky and the jobs created building all of this and no cost fuel.. All renewable energy. 

The people that would fight it are those who have stock in oil, nuclear, coal and gas turbine plants. Well guess what. That's just too damned bad. Electric cars existed in the past and were crushed by those who had the same stocks. Now that we have stripped most of the World of oil and created crap to breath, why should we worry about their continuation of greedy money?? Fracking certainly isn't a good thing. The sun has been something we all have counted on since the beginning of man and nature. Can it be better?? OF COURSE!!!!!!  Can we do better? Of course... We just need to do what is best for all...

Look at what Germany is doing for power and tell me the USA can't do it and do it better!! We certainly see more sun than they do!!

[JB400]

I highly doubt that the windmills are going to decrease the electrical grid.  If anything, I think they'd actually increase the grid.

[Steve P.]

I'm lost...

I'm not saying it would make the grid bigger or smaller. I am saying that the land is already owned and the path for power is already there. The mills I have seen ALL have their power cables buried, so think getting rid of the monster steel erector sets that go for ever across this country and replacing them with windmills and solar would be a multiple PLUS for the entire World. Not just us... Much of the grid is overdue for replacement already. Why not make the best sense of it and convert to wind and solar now??

[ws23rt]

I agree Ghoste. I don't think I would be happy with my nice quiet country land and home being disrupted by windmills. But we have to face the reality of what we are doing to the environment also... Every time we make a change someone isn't going to like it. The fact is, we have to do something and right now the best answer is solar and wind. It's going to take some time to get it all right, just as it has for everything else, but what they are working on today is BY FAR better than anything of the past... WS23RT and I can tell you horror stories, I guarantee you.. I have never spoken with WS23RT before about work, but there is no way he has worked in this field and NOT seen and know about the disastrous downside that nobody ever hears about.. We just suit up the best we can and work as diligently as possible. Fly ash comes immmmmediatly to mind along with leaky pumps at the nuke sites. Then look at the garbage burners.. The EPA has done a pretty good job making them filter, but still the numbers of ALLOWABLE PPM of carcinogens is crazy.....

Yes, I like windmills.....  

I can indeed attest to some horror stories. However the stories I remember the most speak to mishandling equipment and other stupid mistakes that people make. Not only in design but operation. I can also attest to things being done that are so far over the top about cover your ass just in case it would piss off anyone.

Example---I was torque checking case bolts on a back up feed water turbine at a nuke plant. Their were two dozen bolts at least and the torque wrench used needed to be calibrated.  (For the CYA record). So my partner the QC note taker and I would calibrate the torque wrench in house at the plant shop. We would then suit up and enter containment. (an ordeal in it's self). We would together identify a particular bolt to be checked and then I would pull the torque wrench until the click was witnessed by the QC guy. That having been done---on to the next task---You guessed it--the next bolt.  We would come out of containment and go to the shop to re calibrate the torque wrench for the next bolt to be checked. This took some time.  This example point of the nuclear industry explains or describes a big part of why we don't enjoy the clean benefits of atomic power. ---Clear and simple--It is fear. We are afraid that we may be making a mistake.

Another (rather new industry) is fracking to release natural gas. The initial strong response is negative. I cannot help but smile. It could be the worst thing since microwaves   but the sure thing is that it is bad.

INMO those that fear something new need to deal with the world we live in along with the rest of us as best you can. Some will strike out and try something new and those that fear the new stuff gain a new set of issues to fear.

We at one time found fire and soon learned it could hurt and kill. But as we figured it out it has become something that moves almost everything including our chargers

This is an issue that can easily be overcome with the proper management and change in the way things are controlled. Their are some things that can't depend on the prompt or proper actions of humans. They/we are not up to the task. Automatic and redundant systems are all around us for that very reason and the lives we live today would be quite different if humans made all the critical decisions.