wireless internet dish/wind turbine tower [RE-wrenches]

[matthew tritt]

Tom,

Wow-eeee. This sounds pretty interesting. But. One thing you might be
careful about is any frequency noise from the turbine blades themselves
(plus the alternator of course). I seem to recall that there can be some
weird feedback, if that's the correct word, between a parabolic receiver and
rotating blades. This was a big problem with windfarm installations way back
when, but perhaps your blade arc swings far enough above the dish.

Around here, central California, I've noticed the fruits of a suggestion I
made early last year to a Cell phone tower installation company, in the form
of conventional water pumping windmills sprouting up all over the place,
with no plumbing at all, just 4 inconspicuous antennae sticking out of the
side of the towers! Kee=rap. I should have protected myself somehow. Pretty
funny, considering you have to go through all kinds of pain to put a wind
turbine in (not to methion a cell tower!) but not a pumper!

Is there no justice?

Matt T
----- Original Message -----
From: "Tom Simko" <tom at skylinesolar.com>
To: <RE-wrenches at topica.com>
Sent: Thursday, February 13, 2003 8:14 PM
Subject: wireless internet dish/wind turbine tower [RE-wrenches]


> Fellow Wrenches,
>
>  Today I had a guy drive up to my off grid place and knock on the door.
The
> first thing out of his mouth was "I noticed your wind turbine tower", and
I
> thought it was, as  has happened many times in the past, someone that just
> had to know how it all (my off grid system) worked. I am always happy to
> show a neophyte around my place, you never know, it may result in a sale,
as
> has  happened in the past.
>
>  It turns out he's a rep for a wireless internet company, new to my rural
> area (SE Idaho), and my 50' 4 legged tower, currently occupied by a
Whisper
> H-80, very soon to be replaced by a AWP 3.6 (as soon as next week) fit the
> bill as to height and location for one of their network dishs. He went on
to
> say that if I gave permission, they'd come in and run a buried phone line

> from the road to the tower base, install an 18" mesh dish 5' below the
tower
> top (from the top of the 4 legged tower its another 6' of 2 1/2" pipe to
the
> base of the turbine itself, and as the dish would point west, and the
> prevailing winds are south in my area I'm not concerned aerodynamically),
> and all they need is an outlet to plug their repeater or whatever it is
> into.
>
>   At this I laughed and told the guy that I was totally off grid and while
> this may be possible it'd take some looking into, we'd need to get some
> power consumption figures etc, and I'd have to figure the load on my 1200
> watt PV/ 1000 watt wind system. He mentioned that it shouldn't be a
problem,
> the gear in his estimation drew little power. Then I pointed out IF the
> numbers worked the advantage to the company would be continuous power
> regardless of grid outages (pretty reliable around here, outages are brief
> and infrequent, darn it). He said that he'd get back to me tomorrow with
> exact numbers as to how much power would be required, its a given the need
> would be 24/7. I suggested checking with the company engineer's to see if
a
> low voltage DC repeater was available, and then pointed out the cost
> effectiveness and potentially greater reliability of a simple DC system,
and
> how a autonomous system, with its own PV panels/batteries, located on my
> property, using my tower, but separate from my home power system but
perhaps
> using it as a backup, would give a very great degree of reliabilty. He
> thought that was a great idea, but was puzzled as to who would know about
> all that solar stuff, he did not realize until I took him over to the shop
> and showed him my current project, (pun intended) a 960 watt PV off grid
> system that I had just finished putting together prior to delivery to the
> customers site, that I was in the business. So now it looks like not only
> will I lease my tower site to them, I'll sell the power equipment and
> install it. It gets better: I pointed out that since I have a trencher and
a
> boom truck (10 ton, 84' reach, very handy) I could handle ALL of the work.
> Sweeet.... They want to provide me with free internet access using their
> system (1,500,000 BPS) in exchange, but I think I can keep my old cable
> based provider, its adequate for my needs, costs me 35 a month including
> hosting my website, and shake them down for a monthly cash payment. He
> mentioned they may pay as much as 200 a month if the tech problems are few
> or minor and if I'd be willing to sign a contract.
>
>  Anyway, first question is: anyone know if they can expect any electronic
> interference from the Trace 4024SW, the SolarBoost 50DL, the soon to be
> installed AWP or any other component of my off grid system?  Second
> question: anyone else with a wind turbine tower been approached with an
> offer like this? If so, what'd they offer and how'd it work out?
>
> Already spending the money,
>
> Tom Simko
> Skyline Solar
>
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