CoolIP index                                                          Most recent edit: Wednesday October 24, 2012

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Role of Static Nodes in a WingMill Harmonic Lattice

An overlooked concept in our oscillating-wing-array design toolkit is the notion of Nodes and Antinodes. We see wingmills clearly enough as harmonic oscillators, but seem rather blind to the fact that our networked oscillators are Antinodes dependent on a Static Node network. The staked-out static-node network supports and couples the oscillating elements for harmonic synchrony (or metachrony). We tap the antinodes for power, to pump or even drive phased crankshafts. This would be a self-excited oscillation that could be tuned to match wind to load.

We knew this on a sort of preverbal level, but now we have a more explanatory theoretical basis to speed our progress. Our static-node nets would include stable lifters staked out in a quasi-solid structure, bridged with active wingmills sweeping resonantly within their cells. Wayne German's megascale "Vertical Blind" concept would in effect do short-cycle "buzzing" rather than making long majestic tacks across the sky.

CoolIP*                      ~Dave Santos                 20April2012                  AWES6072   

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*Legal Note: coolIP is hereby defined as a Creative-Commons Unported NonCommercial Share-Alike License,
so now we are integrated with the latest standard cooperative IP model, but "coolIP" remains a nice shorthand.