Olin said:
> This design doesn't work that way.  It is a drag versus lift 
> design.  The right side is essentially a flat plate being 
> pushed forwards by the wind.

Yes, but I believe it COULD work that way.

> When the paddles are at front and back they are at 45deg to 
> the wind.  I also don't see a good reason why running faster 
> than the wind speed is inherently better.  High torque at low 
> speed is not inherently better or worse than low torque at 
> high speed.  It depends on the desired application, like 
> pumping water, making a vacuum, generating electricity, etc. 
>  And of course there are various ways to convert along the 
> torque/speed tradeoff scale.

Very true. I mention the desire for higher speed only because that is what
most people want: Fast rotation to drive a generator.

> > The biggest problem I see with wind power is that A) the 
> wind is way 
> > up there in the air and gets (much) slower as you approach 
> the ground
> > B) anything that you lift way up into that good wind can 
> fall / fly a 
> > long way and C) if it is heavy, it's going to do a lot of 
> damage when 
> > it hits the ground.
> 
> This means you want to build it next to someone else's house.

<grin> Ah, you see right through me. The real question is "how can I build a
windmill on my 1/4 acre suburban lot." The options are low to the ground and
heavy or high in the air and very, very light.

> > The version I designed (see the page above) is actually similar to 
> > your design, except that it uses sails instead of solid paddles and 
> > the air pressure on the driven (leading or running) sail is used to 
> > pull the trailing sail into a tight trim.
> 
> I've never heard of that idea before.

I think with some levers or cams in between the lines that connect the two
sides to each other, the efficiency could be improved. The idea is to ensure
no matter the angle of the sail to the wind, it is property trimmed. Just
like a sail boat. There is a patent for that (a set of sail boats around the
rim of a merry-go-round) but the trimming of the sails was managed by a
complex set of levers and poles. I think something simpler could be
developed, much like your gear train.

> > I've been turning over in my mind a sort of dirigible with sail 
> > "wings" that would be turned about its axis by the sails and use a 
> > single mooring line looped over a pulley at the nose.
> 
> And that idea is new to me too.  I'm not sure how ultimately 
> practical these are, but I think it's good to come up with 
> new ideas and explore them.

Keeps me from thinking about sex all the time.

> Others may think up refinements in the future or a particular 
> problem may come along where that set of tradeoffs happens to 
> fit well.
> 

Which is why the web is so great. I put all my crazy ideas up and sometimes
people comment on them and bring them one step closers to reality.
http://www.massmind.org/techref/ideas.htm

---
James.
 

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