Glad to hear it's going well for you. I am also happy to see your developing in an area comparable to where I would like to see AWE take off, the upper midwest.

Brian

"only twice" not sure the cost of the tether wouldn't be worth it.
Sure, at some point it no longer makes sense to go higher but double is still pretty significant.

Brian

That sound's really cool. Loads of pics please. I'm going to do a drawing of a progressively launching lobster tail kite structure as a lift mechanism. I see it as working by having control arms with multiple progressively thickening inside tether winding pulleys at base for releaseing the lifters progressively. It will be fit to my sea basket structure moving around the outer ring with the power gen rings hoisted inside these lines.
Problem is I'll have to be good and wide to avoid interference with the spinning towers.
If it looks improbable i'll bar mount it then fly it with direct tower top hub tethering.

*World Wing Running Association 

http://www.energykitesystems.net/WWRA/index.html

A lot of new developments which go against the grain of standard business get cease and desist orders from patent trolls. Small and defenceless companies get chewed up and spat out with massive legal team costs...

Data is getting cheaper to process. One thing I may rely on when my day comes...

Crowd sourced legal teams,

Sitting in court beside me when the patent trolls tell me to cease and desist because they thunked of a kite furst, will be my laptop and maybe one lawyer qualified to be there and coordinate a team of volunteers sharing folders, wiki voted strategies, case notes, video, tasks...
As long as I have https fast into the court room, and all the advisers are group vetted ...

An open source hardware model may stand a chance.

Hi Theo
Thanks for asking.
You can use Google to find these answers:

Google Selsam EISG:
Link:
http://www.energy.ca.gov/2007publications/CEC-500-2007-111/CEC-500-2007-111.PDF
California Energy Commission-funded prototype independently tested by Windtesting.com yielding six times (6x) the power of a single-rotor turbine.

Google: selsam gipe
Link:
http://www.wind-works.org/wulf/DougSelsamsSuperTwinatWulfField.html
Paul Gipe, the world's leading wind energy author's test of a dual-rotor SuperTwin(TM) which he said "is more powerful than other turbines he's tested" (market leaders Bergey and Southwest). You can also find his data for the other brands on this site.

Google: selsam popsci
Link:
http://www.popsci.com/node/21640
A 25-rotor airborne SuperTurbine(R) wins PopSci Invention of The Year 2008. The flexibility of SuperTurbine(R) to go airborne is demonstrated by using a SuperTurbine(R) as a tether for balloons, where the ballons lift the SuperTurbine(R)

Ordering:
Link:
http://www.DualRotor.com
Our first product is a dual-rotor upwind/downwind SuperTurbine(R) called the SuperTwin(TM), also sometimes known as The Winklevoss.
The SuperTwin has been installed around the world.

In the past several weeks we've had a design/testing breakthrough in fine-tuning the SuperTwin overspeed protection. The SuperTwin(TM) can now survive sustained high winds, of any speed, for any period of time, without burning out the generator. Or so we think.........

Superturbine(R) enjoys worldwide patent protection in an ever-expanding world I.P. portfolio.

"Yew Aint Seen Nuthin' Yet!"
:)
Doug Selsam

In sports we have a name for this:
"Armchair Quarterback"
This is a guy who
"knows how to run a football team"
who
"could do a better job, if HE had the job"
whose favorite team COULD win, if only they would listen to HIM...
Only thing is, the armchair quarterback,
being
"on the couch",
is
"out of shape"
too busy to ever
"know the rules"
he is destined to remain forever
"on the sidelines"
wishing someone would listen to his
"superior strategy"

Why talk about patents as though you are looking in from the outside? nose against the glass,
breath fogging your view,
dismayed in your confusion
feeling rejected in your laziness
an armchair athlete!
The term cuts across many disciplines.

the door is open
a bird in a cage
may never realize
that door is open

:)

Funny that Doug,

Doug schrieb:
...

Thanks for the links, Doug. The avaible dual rotor generator seems a good start
for your 6616402 concept. It would be ideal for our house if I can get planning
permission (we live in a "protected" area and have to "fight" for each window
and solar panel).

The popular Science photo of the huge turbine string is very good (I count 25 of
the 30 rotors!). I note the shaft is too bendy to work in the manner suggested
in patent 6616402 but you have solved this with a balloon. Dave Santos in a
subsequent mail suggests scalability problems of the tube, the "elephant
effect". (Insects and small animals can consist of strong, light structures,
whereas elephants need heavy, large diameter legs.)
Your patent offers solutions such as a tensegrity tube. Another one which comes
to mind is thin alloy or reinforced plastic tube which is sufficently
pressurised with air to avoid denting and buckling (I built a catamaran once
using this principle and the bladder spars of kitesurf-kite are similar.)
Maybe the tube can have a large enough diameter and be light enough so that it
can support itself including the rotors, which might themselves be very light or
even inflatable (if my former employer Keith Stewart is reading this he will
applaud!)
If my reasoning is correct, it might be possible to avoid or delay the scale
effect and implement your 6616402 concepts in a "soft" structure. It would also
look more "organic" than like now "technical" and appeal to customers interested
in "organic art".
Spinning my fantasy a bit further, future "knitting machines" might be able to
knit the tubes including rotors automatically. They would then be sealed with a
resin and inflated.
Sorry, getting carried away. Gotta get planning permission...

Cheers, Theo

Hey Dave S.:
Your systems have a grave flaw: they don't exist.
Thanks for your flawless summary of the patent I was asked about.
And thanks for denigrating the fact that I answered a question.

I'm sorry that Superturbine(R) seems so good that you can't stand it. Heck, Superturbine(R) is only one idea of many. Other AWE concepts that occur to me also seem potentially fruitful. As we've seen, you're allergic to anything that could actually work. Not unusual in wind energy: it takes years of experience for some people to really "get it", though others can read a book on the subject and be up to speed more quickly.

As usual, it all goes right over your head. You seem to find a single embodiment from the 100+ illustrations, make up your own rules about its behavior, fixate on some fantasy flaw based on complete ignorance of wind turbine behavior, let alone Superturbine(R) behavior, then disregard the fact that the patent introduces a new concept with wide applicability.

As I've become accustomed to, you have written what you seem to think is some sort of rebuttal. Rebuttal of what? I'm a bit puzzled why you fixate on seemingly denying everything I write about wind energy. I'm out fabricating a rotor that will be finished in a few hours. It should be good for about a kilowatt and takes a couple hours to make including paint and leading edge tape.
Cost: a couple dollars for the wood and a couple more for the paint.

Leading edge tape: something people involved in wind energy find indispensible, while others ask "what's leading edge tape?"

There's one more litmus test for you:
How much leading edge tape have you gone thru this year?

You know, I have to say, I'm beginning to realize there is literally no place for anyone who actually knows about, or practices, wind energy, on this list.

I think I'm done.
Have fun flying kites.
Kites are fun!
bye.

IREF   infinite-range electric flight

• AWES charge lofted batteries; flying aircraft swipe the charge to their ultracapacitors and then fly to the next recharge AWES charge station
• AWES charge lofted batteries; flying aircraft meet the station to exchange depleted batteries for charged batteries.
• AWES loft fuel; aircraft come by to refuel; station such lofted AWES fuel stations on popular or heavy-payload routes.
• Flight of the Century (planning 2012)   ... planning a descent regeneration FF-AWE method for part of the flight. 
• Use AWES to charge batteries that are on the ground; use part of the power to fly a "refueling" aircraft up to the never-down electric aircraft.  Make an exchange of batteries. 
• Use AWES aloft; generate aloft; as the IREF aircraft passes near, then beam energy to the IREF aircraft from the AWES accumulated energy. 
• ?
• ?

https://css.paperplaza.net/conferences/scripts/abstract.pl?ConfID=44&Number=423  Read abstract here. 

When a ship is detected the administrator can manage kites  upward for a static flight,that for a higher angle giving more passage, and with a much lesser tension in lines. Note that the hindrance to ship traffic is a problem called by the opponents of offshore conventional wind energy.

PierreB

http://flygenkite.com

The pumping cycle versus continuous rotation:
Efficiency: reduced
Capacity factor: impaired
Intermittency: increased
Speed to drive generator: too low
Continuous output: no
motive force: thrust
native speed for generation: too slow
overspeed protection: no
unattended launch: no
unattended operation: no
storm survival: no
Solution to noncontinuous output and weak performance:
"laddermill" concept introduced by me in the 1970's
Better solution: rotating propellers driving generators as practiced by the multi-billion-dollar wind energy industry.
- Doug Selsam
'bye again...

Saw a comercial about a product called XHose, very clever product that may be fashioned for sending down air presure to be converted into usable power. Dave Santos check it out!

Dan'l

https://www.xhose.ca/

Want to win a contest?

http://www.cleantech-to-spacetech.com/index.html

Cool. I have a new favorite. They're actually making stuff. They are doing the simulations. They are doing three(multiple) kites on one generator. They are looking at both high and low L/D. They are working on the other details that these systems entail. All the stuff I would do If I were actually doing it.

I will take up Doug's rebuttal inline below.

Brian

Hi,

The Visventis rig test on Saturday went as well as we could hope. After
concerns that it would be too calm the wind was actually a bit strong
for our kites, but at least it made it easy to launch them. We were able
to control them with our rig so we are confident that it is now worth
the effort of moving on to the next stage. A generator and control
electronics are needed. An initial report and photos are at
http://visventis.org/

Robert.

"
Not yet"

Yes by slowing or stopping crosswind kite motion.

PierreB

--- In AirborneWindEnergy@yahoogroups.com, "blturner3" <yahoo2@... wrote:
doing the simulations. They are doing three(multiple) kites on one
generator. They are looking at both high and low L/D. They are working
on the other details that these systems entail. All the stuff I would do
If I were actually doing it.
reel-in. It also has to put power back in. Vs. a traditional turbine
that has 90% of it's material in the mast, hub, and inner part of the
blade.
the same as a regular turbine.
by the multi-billion-dollar wind energy industry.
<joefaust333@ a
tactic
the
return-low-resistance

For offshore anchorage:http://sway.no .Tilting tower is a step towards offshore AWES (for other tilted masts see also www.selsam.com/ ).

To increase FlygenKite 'output see Wind Lens .The ring is a diffusor,not a device of type Venturi.

PierreB 

http://web.mit.edu/hml/ncfmf.html 

Correct me if I'm wrong,...Overspeed protection is about saving your generator / alternator windings from burning up because they can't hold back the blades, that's covered by shunt engagement of extra windings at higher speeds and setting outside kite lines on bungee to give loose leach response spilling gusts. lift kites pulling the generator to the side or down would do too. A cooled braking system will cause a ring set to twist downward (almost like that elastic hose we saw) as rings wind together (tethers joining at less than 1 ring diameter)
sorted.

Storm survival.
Pack it away. storms are highly predictable. keep an inner hard working core set of lines to prevent fly away in prolonged damaging gusts.

Self launching
LEI surf kites self launch.
progressing scale (lobster tail) small kite lifts first in lightest wind aiding larger and larger lifters.
Done on the water surface your worry is no wind when the kites will go more with the tides. patrol tug boat keeps the top line tight in direction of next most likely downwind.

Unattended. I don't want any unattended machine. Humans need jobs.

Brian:
Your response indicates you do not know the definition of the term "capacity factor". It refers to the fraction of energy contained in the wind you can capture based on your swept area, wherever that swept area may be. Most windfarm turbines hope for 30-40%
The "intermittency" for any working surface (single kite?) (blade?) is not improved by multiple kites (blades). Intermittency for the generator, yes, but the rest of the system must be redundant, which multiplies costs for the same power output. If I showed you a wind turbine that needed 3 times as much blade and drivetrain to do the same job is that an improvement? It all comes down to economics.

Thought experiment:
1) Take 3 General Electric 1.5 Megawatt turbines.
2) Remove the generators and gearboxes and let the rotors spin freely.
3) Place the turbines on rails so the can slide upwind/downwind
4) engineer a redundant winch system so all 3 General Electric turbines are sliding alternately upwind and downwind on their rails, pulling on the winches while other winches are powering a retraction cycle, together powering rotation of a shaft with whatever energy is left over...
5) attach a generator to the shaft
6) or do we need 3 separate generators?
7) and a lot of electronics and programming?
8) At what point do you admit you've created a "clusterflux" situation?
9) Compare your output to a single G.E. 1.5 Megawatt turbine operating as designed.
10) Run the numbers and see how economical this engineering solution turns out to be
11) address and solve all reliability issues
12) Now make it fly. :)
13) repeat steps 1-12

As always, the idle musings of someone with ZERO familiarity with the real world of wind energy.
Idiots have been claiming their contraption need not address overspeed from day 1. "I'll just shut it down! - Storms are "highly predictable"! -
Famous last words.
Once again, it's "groundhog day".
They go to the store and come back to find their machine destroyed or burned out, scratch their heads and ask "what happened"?

Here's what happened:
You went to the store to buy some bread. It got windy in the half-hour you were away.
Hey Roderick, why not go convince the wind energy industry to start ignoring its main challenge for the last 1000 years, overspeed protection?
Let's see, how are wind turbines classified?
By their method of overspeed protection!
Therefore it must be insignificant!
Insignificant in the mind of someone who has never had the problem of making too much power - one with no experience in wind energy.
I know, I know, this is all way "over your head"...
Sorry about that.

Overspeed protection is not the main thing.
It's the ONLY thing in wind turbine design.
Making power is easy - not a mystery - follow the formula.
Controlling that power, or not, is when failure begins.
It all starts when it gets windy. And windier. And windier.
The exact windpseed is not predictable.
So a solution to shut down the system when strong winds approach will result in a further reduction in capacity factor.
Because you will not be able to shut down your system once the strong winds have already started, so you will have to keep it on the ground whenever there is any chance of strong winds.
So while real wind energy people are counting the dollars harvested, you will be saying "maybe not today..."

That's the way to do an experiment - don't waste a lot off money, just get it done. But the idea that your new system is best deployed in undeveloped areas is one of the most common dubious claims made by purveyors of systems that are simply not good enough for regular areas. So far, of the thousands of new wind energy systems developed under that claim, none has proven effective... To this day, undeveloped area must use the same turbines as everyone else to get a decent result. If a system works well, everyone will use it. If not, not.

Interesting - thanks Dave Culp.
note:
L/D for wind turbine blades can be around 200.
************************

According to Makani Press.???
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/06/03/494149/do-flying-wind-turbines-make-sense/#comment-383006

I'm comming slowly to electricity too. Especially to one wire like here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAz3tV45xc4
As I understand, it doesn't depend on wire thikness, so it possible to decrease the weight of transmission

Overspeed protection is not the main thing.
Not in the UK Doug. Maybe in happy land USA. Had you bothered to read or try to understand (I don't think you have yet) my description of fail safe modes through to to collapse, continuing generation through out of spec wind speeds ... you may have seen that there is more involvement. see below. Read it this time. Re-read what you missed. Now, do you want to share anything useful? like say gyroscopic effects modelling on the long shaft generator? New CFD results? anything constructive please.

Specific design considerations will be required in respect of:
• manufacturer's turbine certification;
• manufacturer's operations manual and maintenance instructions;
• results of factory acceptance testing;
• provision of assembly instructions, drawings and design information for the construction phase;
• assembly criteria and workmanship standards to be achieved;
• inspection, test and commissioning criteria and documentation;
• interfaces between turbine mechanical, LV and HV activities;
• safe isolation of mechanical and electrical equipment for maintenance, e.g. locking-off devices,
clamping of rotating parts;
• fail-to-safe modes, e.g. to ensure all critical component failures fail to a safe condition and prevent
additional runaway failure events;
• earthing and protection;
• safe remote control/operation, e.g. preventing remote control when a machine is being maintained;
• in-service condition monitoring systems, devices and components;
• insulation of electrical equipment and cables;
• guarding of dangerous parts of machinery;
• turbine overspeed control;
• controls, e.g. for starting or changing operating conditions, stopping, emergency stop;
• provision of clear and unambiguous markings and warnings;
• provision of safe working access, e.g. striving to minimise the risks associated with vertical ladders
by way of safety harness anchor points, providing rest platforms, powered personnel hoists, lighting,
including emergency lighting;
• the selection of work equipment for work at height must:
- be suitable and sufficient, and be of adequate strength for its intended use;August 2010 Guidelines for Health & Safety in the Wind Energy Industry Sector 38
- be appropriate to the nature of the work to be performed and the foreseeable loadings on it;
- allow passage without risk for the duration and frequency of use;
- offer collective protection over personal protection;
• provision of safe work areas;
• preventing unauthorised access and control of the equipment, e.g. security and passwords, only
allowing control by personnel in the nacelle during maintenance;
• practicality of access by helicopter;
• the need for fire detection/protection;
• provision of a safe means of escape;
• provision of accommodation and emergency rations;
• occurrences of incidents and near events as collated and reported on the RenewableUK Health and
Safety Database, including all safety alerts issued;
• emergency response arrangements for the evacuation and removal of injured personnel from the
turbine and treatment of injured personnel in remote locations;
• PPE;
• avoidance of or minimising the need for working on, near or over water;
• provision of appropriate navigation aids, i.e. lights and foghorn;
• access to navigation aids for maintenance;
• access onto turbines and other offshore structures;
• potential damage, wear and corrosion from waves and weather;
• potential damage from ship collisions;
• specific implications of fire at an offshore installation;
• access to the base of the wind turbines from a vessel, whether by mooring alongside a landing stage
or via a personnel transfer system, to take account of tidal range and tidal streams; this must also be
considered for met mast locations;
• provision and storage for survival suits, buoyancy aids and PLBs;
• provision of appropriate systems for communication between personnel located on offshore
structures and the attendant vessels, vessels and the shore-based control centres, and emergency
services;
• the need to undertake subsea remotely operated vehicle (ROV) operations during the construction or
operational phases (in preference to diving);
• the need to undertake unavoidable diving operations, either during the construction or operational
phases;
• Provision of suitable first aid as part of the risk assesment
• the need to remotely stop turbine blades in the appropriate formation to allow for access by
helicopter; and
• emergency response arrangements, including the provision of first aid equipment, rations and
equipment in the event of stranding.
In putting into effect these design issues, direct reference should be made to the relevant regulations,
codes of practice, standards and guidance that may apply

Not bored yet... try these http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2007/320/contents/made

I bake my own bread by the way.

Come to think of it I think I explained Capacity Factor wrong. Sure there is a capacity factor related to total awept area, but the term is more usually applied to the total energy output over time, of a turbine installed at a particular site, as a numerator in a fraction where the denominator is the nameplate power rating of the turbine multiplied by the number of hours measured. And it's more of a measure of the site combined with the way the turbine was rated, than a measure of a turbine per se. (In fact it is meaningless to talk of a capacity factor of just a turbine model without it being installed at a particular site.) Therefore a "10 kW" (nameplate rated power) turbine measured over 24 hours would have a capacity factor equal to its total energy output divided by 240 kWh over those 24 hours.
On-paper tricks to raise the capacity factor: Add more rotor compared to the amount of generator (creating a "low windspeed turbine"), and/or rate the power at a lower windspeed, and your turbine will then enjoy "a higher capacity factor".
Which way you rate your machine, as usual, comes down to buyer mentality and incentives: if you're getting a rebate based on installed nameplate capacity, rate it at the highest windspeed possible. (That was how one company shut down the whole California small wind rebate system. The gatekeepers were clueless about any of these facts, as it turned out.) Similarly to impress the buyer with a high power rating. Wind energy veterans protest, citing reliability above all, and total energy capture over time in all windpseeds. Rating your turbine at a lower windspeed is also useful for coming under the bar in getting a permit for putting up your machine or not even needing one.
:)

In today's news:
More energy-capture capacity, for powering a given generator, by increasing rotor diameter, to create a "low windspeed turbine":
LINK:
http://www.nawindpower.com/e107_plugins/content/content.php?content.9949

Imagine how hard you would laugh if Suzlon tried to tell you their system needed no overspeed protection, because "storms are highly predictable". It could then be installed anywhere there was no wind, just keep it away from windfarms which can get 70 mph at hub height on any given day. A cautionary shutdown could be implemented anytime decent winds threatened, lest the winds get a little stronger than predicted...
:)
By the way did anyone know that today is the last day of the big American Wind Energy Association trade show, WindPower 2012?
Oh Come on get real.

Yes, On the capacity factor and intermittency issues we were misunderstanding each other.

The main cause of reduced capacity factor in wind turbines is the intermittency of the wind itself, So I thought that when you said intermittency right after capacity factor you were referring to the in-out cycle intermittence rather than some tendency of the kites not to perform in all the same wind conditions that a regular turbine can.

Higher altitude winds are more powerful and consistent. This helps capacity factor.

Yes, most the current kite designs we discuss here would be conditions limited and suffer from reduced capacity factor as a result. But I put that in the category of "not yet". For example, the designs that have a hard wing and a tail can change their pitch much the same as a traditional turbine.

I like your thought experiment. It heads toward the basic difference in how we see this. A wind turbine translates the lift of the wing into torque with just one basic step. An equivalent kite system has 2 basic steps and many other steps to support the process that complicate the matter. Yes this is clearly a big disadvantage and stands as one of the big challenges to this whole endeavor.

You also seem to imply that the translation through those 2 basic steps of pulling on the tether and turning a generator are somehow dramatically less efficient. I think we disagree here. I should come up with a rebuttal thought experiment but alas I don't have time. Sorry.

Good critique.

Brian

The obvious mix is a car piston and crank in reverse.

The other good point about doing it this way... the rings can be thin and stable into wind like x-zylo's as they are held high but horizontal instead of in a long chain.

This thread was comparing traditional turbines vs the pumping cycle that many AWESs are using today.
If you want to discuss Super Turbine vs "Diamond like internal speed of sound" or any of the other off topic ongoing debates. I believe it would be best if you started a new thread.

Brian

Sorry Roderick I am way too busy to wade through so many (probably meaningless) words. If you have a prototype that makes decent power I would make time to watch a video with instrumentation showing output. (The wind acts pretty much the same in every country.)
***problem: too many words take up your whole day for nothing***
:)