Speaking of wind tower engineering [RE-wrenches]

[carl reuter]

Wrenches: Seeing the recent comments on wind towers reminded me of an
experience I had a few months ago doing an install on a Air 403 and
their tower kit which consists of a few base pieces, four guy wires
and a collar that tightens onto an owner supplied section of the same
galvanized pipe they use horizontally at the top of chain link
fences. The first thing I noticed was that assembling the prop blades
to the hub, the bolts were a bit shy of engaging into the locknuts
all the way and even when fully cranked, never stuck firmly into that
little nylon bit on the nuts. Nothing you can do in the field except
crank harder. The tower went up and we screwed down the bulldog/
cable clamps and a third of them had the nuts strip with barely any
torque applied. I wonder how they'd ever survive being taken off and
on for dropping the tower for any reason and reraising. My gut
feeling was that the nuts having gone soft was a recipe for desaster
and so I added larger, more durable ones in line with the factory
junk that sold in the local hardware store for 25 cents each and were
made in china.A $500 wind generator being held up by  two dollars
worth of pot metal. Ive rigged enough sailboat masts to see the
potential liability there and promptly contacted SWWP by phone and
email and never received a reply from their tech person. They're
history in my book. I cant imagine a semi-unmechanical homeowner
doing one of those installs the way they designed it and not having a
kit fail someday. On another note, I feel between a rock and a hard
place with the grid-tie inverters. In California, we're supposed to
give the customer a 5 year warranty on grid-tied systems so that they
get the $3 a watt buydown rebate and I did three site evaluations
today and in the back of my mind I'm thinking" I'll be driving all
the way out here for 5 years while Trace figures out how to build a
Sun tie that works. I'm very concerned about bidding these jobs and
speccing an unproven inverter for the system. Not everyone needs an
SW and the ST seems a likely pick and the AEI unit is too small,but
what do I tell these people,you have the money but I cant give you
something that will work. Our country lags in technology,what a
shock!I eagerly await progress. Carl Reuter

=====

Land and Sea Solar, Renewable Energy Systems.  Email: carl at landandseasolar.com   

   Phone:831-252-5040     Web:  www.landandseasolar.com


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