Solar vs wind vs hydro

[Adelie]

The problem with wind turbines is not predicting the output for a given wind but predicting the likely winds in the areas you will be cruising for the seasons you will be there.

With winds you have issues with too much and too little wind. There can be un-forecasted or marginally forecasted periods of extended calm with little or no production.
And there can be storms that create so much wind the turbine needs to be struck or it will become a safety hazard.

As regards what kind of turbine to get. I would get a vertical axis turbine and mount it next to the mast above head height.
A. Next to the mast the shrouds will protect the sails from abrasion.
B. That location will also limit the amount of shading on solar panels which are more likely to be mounted near the stern.
C. The vertical axis fits the location better than horizontal.
D. I feel vertical-axis has a safety advantage.
E. There is some research that indicates that horizontal-axis turbines have an efficiency advantage for large installation, for small installations vertical produces more in the long run.


In order of preference:
A. Max out the solar panels. Cover the bimini, dodger and stern arch with panels. I would install an arch just to support panels and nothing else. You will get some production every day. Even in dark and stormy conditions you can expect almost 20% of normal output.
B. Install a vertical axis turbine next to the mast. This will provide output when there is sufficient wind but not too much whether you are underway or not.
C. Hydrogenerator only if it came at a marginal added cost to something I was installing anyway.
Let's say I converted to electric propulsion for the mother ship, I'd cough up an extra 10% for the hydro-gen.
If I was going to get an electric outboard for the dinghy I would pay the marginal upgrade to the version that did hydro-gen and the extra cost of of a mounting bracket on the mothership.
With Hydro-gen you only get output when the mothership is sailing at significant speed, usually 4.5kt or greater. The exceptions are if you anchor in a tidal current zone or in a river with a current of 4.5kt or greater. Neither of those conditions are would be very good for anchoring.

[windpoweroz]

The problem with wind turbines is not predicting the output for a given wind but predicting the likely winds in the areas you will be cruising for the seasons you will be there.

I think it's both. Even once you estimate the winds, figuring out which turbine is best is tricky because the charts are so small and often use different scales (knots, m/s, amps, watts, etc).

As regards what kind of turbine to get. I would get a vertical axis turbine

Have you seen many VAWTs on boats? Interested to hear if you have any thoughts on the different brands.

[hpeer]

Practical Sailor did a 2 part review some years ago.
Maybe look at that for ideas on how to do a comparison, better or worse.

[Na Mara]

Because VAWTs are less efficient than HAWTs you have to have quite a bit of wind to get useful power out of them. For example, the following unit only starts producing energy in apparent winds over 10knots and only produces around 40 watts at 25 knots.

LE-v150

Compare that to a HWAT like the silentwind that will be generating about 400W at 25 kn and you can see why all the manufacturers went for HWAT technology.

Now you can nearly buy 2 LE-v150 units for the price of a silent wind plus mounting, and mounted on the mast they wont reduce your solar input and will suffer less wind shear so should see higher average apparent winds. They also don't suffer from yall effects as much as HWATs. But even with all that said you wont see much output from them in anything much less than a gale. For me , the cost benefit ratio just isn't worth it.

I think you get a better return on a hydrogenerator or a standard HWAT on a pole.

[Adelie]

Originally Posted by windpoweroz

I think it's both. Even once you estimate the winds, figuring out which turbine is best is tricky because the charts are so small and often use different scales (knots, m/s, amps, watts, etc).



Have you seen many VAWTs on boats? Interested to hear if you have any thoughts on the different brands.

m/s x 2 = knots. (close enough, actuallY 1.9440)

I have not seen many VAWT on boats, but that may be a chicken and the egg issue. Users expect a HAWT so that's what suppliers provided.

I didn't think about VAWTs until UMA got one which surprised the heck out of me. I thought about it for a while and it made sense. They traded weight and up front cost for safer operation and more convenient mounting location.

The larger installation with higher weight provides them with more output than a HAWT despite whatever efficiency advantage the HAWT might have.

[wholybee]

Originally Posted by Adelie

m/s x 2 = knots. (close enough, actuallY 1.9440)

I have not seen many VAWT on boats, but that may be a chicken and the egg issue. Users expect a HAWT so that's what suppliers provided.

I didn't think about VAWTs until UMA got one which surprised the heck out of me. I thought about it for a while and it made sense. They traded weight and up front cost for safer operation and more convenient mounting location.

The larger installation with higher weight provides them with more output than a HAWT despite whatever efficiency advantage the HAWT might have.

I met a cruiser with a VAWT and asked him about it. He said that it was far worse that the HAWT that he had previously, and that it did almost nothing. He kept in only because it was an interesting talking point, and he met a lot of new people who would approach him to ask about it. I wouldn't say his was larger or heavier than an HAWT, but about the same size. It was installed on the top of his mizzen mast.

[Adelie]

Originally Posted by Na Mara

Because VAWTs are less efficient than HAWTs you have to have quite a bit of wind to get useful power out of them. For example, the following unit only starts producing energy in apparent winds over 10knots and only produces around 40 watts at 25 knots.

LE-v150

Compare that to a HWAT like the silentwind that will be generating about 400W at 25 kn and you can see why all the manufacturers went for HWAT technology.

Now you can nearly buy 2 LE-v150 units for the price of a silent wind plus mounting, and mounted on the mast they wont reduce your solar input and will suffer less wind shear so should see higher average apparent winds. They also don't suffer from yall effects as much as HWATs. But even with all that said you wont see much output from them in anything much less than a gale. For me , the cost benefit ratio just isn't worth it.

I think you get a better return on a hydrogenerator or a standard HWAT on a pole.

You don't need more wind to get more power out of a VAWT, you can use a bigger swept area instead.

The VAWT above is so small that it is almost a toy despite it's price.

Better would be https://www.tesup.us/product-page/at...ine-for-houses
$1120
I1126mm tall including generator housing and 460mm wide.
At 4m/s (9kt) it produces about 100W.


The Silent wind needs 19kt of wind to produce 100W at which point the Atlas7X will be producing 1694W

https://www.silentwindgenerator.com/en/marine/
Pg 10: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1pJs...xIS/view?pli=1

[Adelie]

Originally Posted by wholybee

I met a cruiser with a VAWT and asked him about it. He said that it was far worse that the HAWT that he had previously, and that it did almost nothing. He kept in only because it was an interesting talking point, and he met a lot of new people who would approach him to ask about it. I wouldn't say his was larger or heavier than an HAWT, but about the same size. It was installed on the top of his mizzen mast.

Do you know the make and/or model?
The diameter of the drum makes a HUGE difference.

[wholybee]

Originally Posted by Adelie

Do you know the make and/or model?
The diameter of the drum makes a HUGE difference.

No, but it was comparable in size to a typical HAWT. Of course, if it is greatly larger than a typical HAWT it will produce more power. But so would be a greatly larger HAWT.

[fxykty]

Originally Posted by Adelie

You don't need more wind to get more power out of a VAWT, you can use a bigger swept area instead.



The VAWT above is so small that it is almost a toy despite it's price.



Better would be https://www.tesup.us/product-page/at...ine-for-houses

$1120

I1126mm tall including generator housing and 460mm wide.

At 4m/s (9kt) it produces about 100W.





The Silent wind needs 19kt of wind to produce 100W at which point the Atlas7X will be producing 1694W



https://www.silentwindgenerator.com/en/marine/

Pg 10: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1pJs...xIS/view?pli=1

The Atlas is interesting but I’m not sure where you could mount it without it either getting in the way of sails or majorly shadowing solar panels. Not much hard data on the site (weight? maximum wind speed?) and a wax coating to prevent corrosion doesn’t seem to be ready for marine conditions with caked salt everywhere. But at the price you could replace it every three or four years and come out ahead.

[Adelie]

Originally Posted by fxykty

The Atlas is interesting but I’m not sure where you could mount it without it either getting in the way of sails or majorly shadowing solar panels. Not much hard data on the site (weight? maximum wind speed?) and a wax coating to prevent corrosion doesn’t seem to be ready for marine conditions with caked salt everywhere. But at the price you could replace it every three or four years and come out ahead.

The mounting position I have seen that makes the most sense to me a is abeam the mast between the double lowers. If your vessel doesn't have double lowers then I withhold opinion until I see the exact arrangement of shrouds.

Page 9:
54lb/24.5kg

Page 11:
1126mm tall x 460mm dia / 3'8" tall x 1'6" dia

Pg 28:
Describes shutdown procedures for when wind exceeds 27m/s (52kt)

[Adelie]

Originally Posted by wholybee

No, but it was comparable in size to a typical HAWT. Of course, if it is greatly larger than a typical HAWT it will produce more power. But so would be a greatly larger HAWT.

A 400-500W HAWT has about a 4' diameter disc which means that it can occupy a 4' diameter sphere when you consider all possible wind directions.

The 7kW VAWT I indicated above occupies a cylinder 1.5' dia X 4' tall.
Let's say it gets 1/10th the power advertised, that's still 700W.

Another different between HAWT & VAWT is that lines hitting the rotors are shed off by VAWTs whereas they may become entangled in the HAWTs.

[bergius]

Inspired by a related thread on YBW, I finally got around to running the actual numbers for 2023. So this is with the increased panel size (as suggested by this thread) as well as a hydrogenerator. Numbers are Wh per average day each month, just like in my previous graphs:



(Source: gist)

July-September 2023 are not fully representative, as there was a family emergency we had to deal with, and hence the boat spent quite a lot of time in a marina.

[windpoweroz]

Hey guys, I took the time to do some research into the power and energy claims of the most popular micro-wind turbines. This was driven by my frustration that nothing like this already exists on the internet.

https://windpower.com.au/resources/m...formance-guide

I'd love to get feedback on the article. It doesn't attempt to answer every question you might have about buying a turbine, but focusses on one of the most important questions: "How much energy can I get out of this thing?".

In doing this research, I also uncovered some dubious claims by one manufacturer.