Wind Arrow

[Les MacDonald]

I've been looking at a new wind turbine, the Wind Arrow, produced in Ontario by True-North, to replace our Lakota which has given up the ghost after only 3 years. The Wind Arrow (1kw at 26 mph) is designed to eliminate the need for mechanical furling with an electronic system for controlling the rpms above 30 mph and shutting down in storms. What I find attractive is the simplicity of the design and, with fewer moving parts, light weight, and potentially more durable in a gusty wind environment.
It hasn't been out long enough for any track record to be posted but I thought I would post here in case anyone might have thoughts on it.
Les

[Rob Beckers]

Hi Les,

The Lakota and Wind Arrow are both made by the same company. If the Lakota only lasted 3 years, what gives you confidence that the Wind Arrow will do better? I have no experience with either one, though I've heard good reports about the Lakota (maybe they weren't correct or the people I talked to didn't have them long enough). Just wondering why you would trust the same company.

-RoB-

[Stewart Corman]

Rob,
I have had some discussions with Dave at True-North about his new manufacturing venture. IMHO, I am in no way endorcing his new product line.

Let me first say that the Lakota was simply being imported from a Chinese vendor who migrated from Arizona (Aeromax) after being erroneously sued by Southwest. Dave had serious quality control issues, so negotiated to build under license in Ayr as a joint venture with the fabrication manufacturer of the in-house tower assemblies he was selling.

Then, all of a sudden, he comes up with a new upwind "patented" "design and "built in Canada" which looks nothing like the Lakota ...Oddly, it looks identical to a Efgen900 unit from Ireland....seems a bit disingenuous to me :

http://www.efgen.com/efgen900%20specs.pdf

That said, no tip up furling and a lot of electronic controls. The blades are mounted on cylindrical spars, so can be tweaked for fixed pitch setting to custom taylor to wind environment. Yes, the parts are derived from China from the same factory(ies), so I can only presume that the Irish unit and the Lakota were being built at the same vendors ....I do NOT know if the electronics/controls/generator were designed/built here or not, but Dave's units are now assembled/tested here. Supposedly he wind tunnel tested them at the laminar flow facility in the University of Western Ontario, but there are no published verified performance specs.

I always have concern over any unit that solely uses electronics to prevent catastophic failure (like downwind Skystream), since one lightening voltage spike....the electronics fry and the unit goes to Never-Neverland.

If anyone has more details, please post

Stew Corman from sunny Endicott

[Les MacDonald]

Stew,
Did you mean to say that the Lakota looked like the Efgen (not the Wind Arrow)? Taking a close look at the Efgen photo, it looks a lot like the Lakota to me, even the furling spring looks identical. But the Wind Arrow looks quite different, check out the product brochure at http://www.truenorthpower.com/. Still, your worry about what happens if the electronics fail might be a concern. Would be surprising if Dave, being very experienced in installing and servicing Lakotas and other turbines, had not taken this into account.
Thanks to you and Rob for your timely postings. I also spoke with Mario by phone. He voiced the same concern as you about the consequences of electronic failure.
Les

[Stewart Corman]

Les,
my mind might have been playing tricks on me, but I had recalled an early photo from True-North that showed a unit identical to Efgen as referenced by Rick Murphy:

http://www.greenpowertalk.org/showpost.php?p=7169&postcount=5

BUT not the photo I linked to (these photos appear and disappear at the blink of an eye).

and this wasn't it either ...the Efgen 1000:
http://www.efgen.com/w2w.htm

If you follow this link:
http://www.bettergeneration.co.uk/wind-turbine-models/the-wind-arrow.html

This is a robust turbine, designed with minimal parts to maximise durability. The blades are carbon fibre so low density and strong. It incorporates a new system called Active Flight Control (AFCTM), which eliminates the need for mechanical furling. The AFC switches the turbine off in storm conditions, testing the windspeed after timedelays and automatically resuming generation when possible. At high wind speeds, SoftStall stalls the turbine without having to cease generation entirely.
Also known as the Efgen 1000 in Europe.
HOWEVER, I found the Efgen link when Rick posted above and since the new Efgen advertises the AFC, we can only assume that Dave has struck a deal for Efgen to resell the upgraded original Efgen 1000. Again, IMHO, the Lakota and Efgen came from the same source in China.


BTW Les, in June, Dave is supposed to offer a slightly larger 2KW rated version and since these are fairly light machines for your installation, I would opt for the larger one and pay a little extra for a 5 year warranty :idea:

Me personally,if I were off-grid, would go for a Skystream (non grid can be done) on it's own 50' pole hinged at the ground, and winch the pole from your existing steel structure.

I am still skeptical on how you can deliver 2KW and still keep the total assembly so light in weight and then use electronic control to limit the rpm ...power in strong wind has to go somewhere?? The only way I see shutting down is a mechanical brake ....others can chime in here

Stew

[Les MacDonald]

Stew, after your post I asked David to solve the mystery. We were both partly right and partly wrong (though you were closer on your most recent post). Here's David's response on the two issues, 1) similarity to Efgen, and 2) possible consequences of failure of the electronic controls in the Wind Arrow:

"True North was only ever a distributor of Lakota and we never manufactured them . . . aeromag had sold some lakotas to EFGEN through tRUE-NORTH Power Systems . . under the name EFGEN 1000 . . therefore some older web pages and EFGEN graphics may "look" like a lakota . . . True North Power Systems was who sold to EFGEN not Aeromag . . . TNPS was my old installation, disrtibution, training and service support company for lakota turbines . . the company no longer exists . .. we tried to make lakota work since 2002 . . good design . . badly built . . . and finally gave up in March April 2008 . . I then began building designing a whole new turbine ( and other products like our solar mounts and the Power Cube) and eventually began filling orders from EFGEN who wanted to now have the WIND ARROW made for them under private label . . hence the apparent similarity of EFGEN to the WIND ARROW . . . however although the turbine is similar the controller is specialized for EFGEN to run their 48v immersion heater . . . not a battery charger . . it's while different in the mode of operation . . quite different software . . . so you see the confusion . . . each of them has a bit of real info that they've made assumptions on and now feel they can comment about how "suspiciously similar" it may look . . .as if there is something going on behind the scenes . . .Ever bought a Compaq portable computer? . . .they were not made by Compaq . . same arrangement.

As far as lightning goes . . NOTHING survives a direct hit from lighting . . not even a steel plate . . so I don't know where that argument comes from . . a Lakota or any other turbine will fry just a quickly . . and you are right to comment that "Would be surprising if Dave, being very experienced in installing and servicing Lakotas and other turbines, had not taken this into account". . . .We did. . . "Fail safe" is a turbine that will not start up . . or if running MUST immediately stop because it can only run if the FLY/STOP relay is HELD OPEN . . any loss of power and it closes stopping the turbine even in 60mph winds . . we've tested to 65mph. If our electronics fry from a direct hit or any anomoly . it does not go to "never-neverland" like some others m
aybe . . it goes to "never-neverSTART" until the circuit or relay is replaced . . the turbine is full fail-safe protected. . . we've tested it." End of Quote.

As for Gwen and I, we have opted for the repair of the Lakota. There seem to be risks to either option that are difficult to evaluate, but for us, the path via repair seems simpler, given our limited knowledge and skills. We don't need a lot of wind power, just a top-up to solar between November and late January.

My thanks to Rob, Mario, Stew, Ralph and Dave for your prompt and helpful interventions.

Les

[Peter Klaassen]

Hi Les,
You may remember a visit to your house a few years ago from me and Dee. We are building a straw bale place near Consecon, and came out on the green house tour. Do you have any indication of what went wrong with the Lakota? I am trying to decide on a wind generator as well and I'm looking for similar advice. Your site was sort of gusty when we visited. Is a variable wind going to wear out a generator faster? Does the more often it furls cause more wear? How does the gryoscopic inertia affect furling? I have been favouring a changing of blade pitch over furling or braking. It would seem to be a more logical way to reduce the rotational speed. That is what you do on a sailboat when there is too much wind - reef down the sail to reduce the force of the wind.
Would you recommend a truenorth generator? I thought they had a decent looking machine, but it isn't very heavily built compared to some of the slightly larger generators (I'm thinking of the Bergy and Eoltec machines)
I will be off the ship soon and if possible I would stop in to chat.
Pete Klaassen

[Les MacDonald]

Hi Pete,
That Green Tour day last year was a bit of a blur to us, over 200 people signed the guest book and a lot more couldn't even get near it. I do recall talking with people building a straw bale house and it must have been you and Dee. Sometime we would like to come and see your project.
The Lakota failed more than once during its 3 years of operation. First time it was due to the furling springs apparently not allowing the blades to tilt up in time to protect the turbine from sudden wind gusts. With weaker springs in place, it then worked fine for a couple of years until, last fall, one spring fell off, again in strong, gusty winds. On inspection, I discovered that the anchor bolt holding that spring had pulled right out of the metal turbine casing. I replaced the spring and fastened it to the hole from which the anchor bolt had pulled out with a steel hook adapted from an old shock cord. Then, last November, we were alerted by very strong vibrations that ice had formed on the blades, yet they continued to spin at a fairly high speed. We had experienced icing on one or two previous occasions, but this was the first time that the blades did not stall. Thereafter, the blades would not turn in a normal wind and testing showed the three leads to be shorted out.
I would say you are right, that a more gusty site, like ours, is probably harder on any turbine. Although the Ontario Wind Atlas shows our site as being "marginal" for wind resources at 10 to 20 m (our height is about 13 m) but the average indicated of about 5 to 6 m/s masks an impressive range of variation. (We built on this site in order to sail but found it too risky to moor a boat off-shore due to the strong winds and high waves.)
Our interest in the Wind Arrow is based on its claim to be more resistant to the gusty winds we experience, as well as the very light and very well balanced blades which should minimize vibration, the latter a consideration for us with the tower mounted on the house. We are not sure, however, whether the particular combination of incidents which disabled our Lakota last November would have been avoided with the electronic control capability of the Wind Arrow. Nor are we sure what we could do in future to avoid such a calamity, aside from shutting down the turbine when icing is forecast. Weather forecasts are often not sufficiently reliable in any case, and it is in the period from November to late January that we need the wind power. We could easily shut down the turbine all summer.
I'd be interested to hear how you decide to manage such problems, which I imagine would be not too different in the Consecon area. And I'm sure we would both benefit from advice from some of the more experienced wind enthusiasts on GPT.
Les