WIND TURBINE 400 WATT

Want to generate your own power? Want to do it easily? Tired of "how to" wind turbine searches that end up not showing you how to actually build one? We are!!!
Here is a simple wind turbine that generates over 12 volts. Most of the parts can be bought at a local home improvement store and the other parts are easy to come by or made.

Step 1: Materials

Materials

Motor - Taken out of an old VCR player, old printer, old scanner, or bought on e-bay. We have found good ones from each place.
PVC Cutter - Use to cut 5' 3/4 and 5' 1" PVC pipe down to size
3/4" PVC Pipe - 1' long or cut to your desired size
3/4" PVC Pipe - 3" long or cut to your desired size
1" PVC Pipe - 1' long or cut to your desired size
1" to 3/4" PVC Pipe Fitting Reducing Tee
3/4" PVC Pipe Union
Plastic - We used an old CD case
Stand - We used a flange
Wire - We are using 22AWG
Wire Stripper

Make or Buy

Blades
We bought some quick propeller blades from Amazon - Link
There are amazing ideas all over that will be better, just look around.
Our best ones we made ourselves but blew away in a storm. We used a pop bottle lid and a McDonalds large drink cup. Cut it, bend it, glued it and sprayed it.

Step 2: Prepare the Pieces

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Cut all the PVC pipe to size.
Remove o-ring from union. The o-ring will prevent the union from swiveling easily.
Wrap the motor in electrical tape till it fits snugly into the 1" to 3/4" PVC pipe fitting reducing tee.
Cut and strip both ends of the wire. Make sure you have plenty of extra wire as it does get wrapped up. Not to worry as it unwraps too.
Split CD case and snap off any pieces sticking out. You could use just about anything flat and thin.
Cut along one side of the 1" x 1' PVC pipe to make a spot for the CD case. We asked Fat Cat for help with this. He used a miter saw, but a hacksaw would work and is less dangerous. Maybe the PVC cutter would work too?

Step 3: Wiring

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Solder the wire to your motor. We soldered and marked the positive motor as negative and negative motor as positive. We did this because we will be getting the energy from the motor and not giving to the motor. The way your blades turn may affect your output differently.
Once soldered, "fish" your wire through the tee, the short 3/4" x 3" PVC pipe, the union, and the 3/4" x 1' PVC pipe.
Drill a small hole through the 3/4" x 1' PVC pipe and fish the wire through that. We used an LED holder over the hole to make it a bit nicer.
Connect all pieces together.
Do Not tighten the union all the way down. It will not allow the turbine to swivel.
Set into flange.

Step 4: Tail Fin

Connect the CD case to the 1" x 1' pipe. Slide into the cut slat.
Connect the 1" x 1' PVC pipe to the 1" to 3/4" PVC Pipe fitting reducing tee.

Step 5: Test and Glue

Test everything and glue together.
Do Not tighten the union all the way down and glue. It will not allow the turbine to swivel.

Step 6: Video

First time trying to get a video to work. Always learning lol

Step 7: Options / Ideas

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The first picture shows a tee with all sides the same width.
In the second and third pictures we added the clear side of the CD case to this mini motor wind turbine and a small solar panel. The motor was to weak to do much but the solar panel collected plenty of light and stored energy in our batteries.
Fourth picture is a blade from an old plastic water bottle. Worked pretty good but there are better out there.
Fifth picture is two of the purchased blades combined together. Works pretty good at low wind speeds and spins very fast.
Sixth picture is a film canister cut and glued. Works well at low speed but does not get the voltage/speed.
Last picture is on the beach. Several people stopped to take a look and learned about instructables.com :-)

Step 8: Best Advice We Could Find

The best advice on how to build a wind turbine came from John Park - Maker Workshop. Everything else was not nearly as good.

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DIY WIND TURBINE AT HOME

I'm very interested in freedom,  and anything you do not have to pay for.

The wind is free ,  but turbines cost a lot ,  so here is how to build a ten foot diameter wind turbine on the cheap.

Step 1: Your tower needs an anchor

Do not under any circumstances dig a hole more than 3 feet deep unless you have been trained to do so.  Small hole collapses kill more people every year and if you do not know what to look for you could be taking a chance with your life.  Respect the threat and if you are unsure find some one that understands the risks and can help.


You don't want your tower to fall over,  so you will need an anchor.  I used over a thousand pounds of concrete that I set five feet deep in the ground.

I started by digging a five foot deep hole.

Step 2: Your turbine needs wind

Turbines need to be up as high as you can get them,  so to get as high as you can you will need a tower.

I made mine with 6x6's.   It's 20 feet tall.

Step 3: turning on a dime, or a bicycle down tube

Your turbine will need to be able to turn into the wind.  Bicycle parts can take a lot of abuse,  so I used them for all my moving parts.  Here is how I used a front wheel fork down tube and bearing housing for my turbine's pivot.

Step 4: electric boogaloo

I've been looking into a generator for some time.  I've read in a few places that this is a really great motor to use and I found it on my first try digging at the dump : )

I'd like to wrap my own coils at some point,  but for right now this will have to do.

Step 5: the cutting edge of power

I've seen many websites that show how to cut blades out of pipe,  but I had never seen anyone use thin wall 6 inch pvc used.  My blades are 4 feet and ten inches long and they are cut to hold a 45 degree pitch from the hub all the way to the tip.

I'm very happy with how they turned out  : )

Step 6: I've got a nose for wind

The nose cone is really just for aesthetics.  I vacuum formed mine and my vacuum form machine's check valve had gone bad ,  so at some point I will need to make another one.  The next one will have a raised ring around it with a v shape to it,  and I'll put a v notch in each blade to hold it in place better.

Step 7: Enjoy the freedom

Now get out there and build a wind turbine !!!!

And remember ,  Be safe ,  Have fun and go green for the green.

It does not have to cost a lot to do great things your imagination is the limit ,

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The Windows 7 Taskbar

The taskbar is the thin strip that runs across the bottom of your screen. It is split into a number of different areas: a round Start button, Quick Launch icons, a notification area, and a clock. All other areas are the Taskbar itself. The image below shows where the different areas are:

The Start button is explained in a section all of its own, as it's probably the most important area of the Taskbar. Click here to go the Start button page:

The Windows 7 Start button

There is one more area on the Taskbar, and it's easily overlooked - the Show Desktop button. In the images above, you can just see a narrow rectangle to the right of the clock:

Click this button to minimize all open programmes and reveal the desktop.

Quick Launch Icons

In the main image above, take a look at the three big icons to the right of the round Start button. These are quick launch icons, meaning you can quickly launch any of the programmes you see there. When you hold your mouse over one of the icons, you'll see a small popup rectangle that shows you a preview of any open windows. In the image below, we're holding our mouse over the Firefox icon. (Firefox is a web browser used to display internet pages. It's Internet Explorer's main competitor.)

In Windows Vista, however, the icons will be smaller, and there's no popup.

Click on the preview window and it opens the programme up in full screen.

There are several ways to add new programmes to the Quick Launch area, but Windows 7 makes it a lot easier. Open up a programme using the Start menu. When it's open, use the right mouse button to click its icon in the Taskbar. A new menu appears:

In the image above, we have Microsoft Excel open. Right-clicking its icon in the Taskbar gave us the above menu. Once "Pin this program to the taskbar" is clicked with the left mouse button, it will appear permanently in the Quick Launch arrear. If you want to get rid of any Quick Launch programmes, the item on the menu will say "Unpin this program from the taskbar" when you right-click.

You can also use the Start menu to add programmes to the Quick Launch area. Again, right-click the programme you want to add. From the menu, select "Pin to Taskbar". In the image below, we're adding Notepad as a Quick Launch icon:

The result is a new icon in the Quick Launch area:

 

Notification Area

(NOTE: The Notification area saw a big change from Windows Vista to Windows 7. You should recognise a lot of the icons below, however, if you have Vista.)

The Notification area, formally called the System Tray, is the area of the Taskbar where you can view programmes and tasks that are running in the background, as well as view important messages about updating your computer. (Although the clock is considered part of the Notification area, we'll look at this separately.)

In the image below, the Notification area shows three icons:

The first one, the white arrow, is for hidden icons. Click the white arrow to see which icons have been hidden:

Probably the only one of the four icons above that you'll have is the speaker icon. This sets the volume for your speakers. If yours is too low, click the speaker icon to see a slider that you can move up and down:

The second of the three icons in the Notification area is a white flag. This flag alerts you to issues that need to be taken care of. Click the flag icon to see if there are any problems:

As you can see, Windows 7 is telling us that there is 1 message, and that it's to do with Windows Defender. You can click on the "1 message" heading at the top, or on the message itself. You can also open the "Action Center" from here.

The third icon that appears in the Notification area (on our computer, anyway) is a Network icon. This tells us that we have an internet connection, and there are no problems. If the internet access is down, there will be a red X through this icon:

The red X will disappear when the problem with the internet is solved.

In the next part, we'll take a look at the Windows 7 clock, and the date and time.

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HOW TO CHANGE WINDOWS 7 BACKGROUND

Desktop Backgrounds and Wallpapers

Windows 7 lets you easily change the image you see on your desktop. This is called the Desktop background, or Desktop wallpaper.

To chage your Desktop Wallpaper, click anywhere on the desktop with your right mouse button, and you should see a menu appear:

One of the items on the menu allows you to personalize your desktop screen. So click on Personalize with your left mouse button to see a window appear. This one:

The main area in the screen above let's you select a Theme from the available list. A Theme sets not only your desktop background, but also a screensaver, the colour of windows, sounds, and mouse pointers. And all that with just one click!

If you just want to set background wallpaper, however, select Desktop Background from the bottom left. The default is called Harmony.

When you click on Desktop Background you should see something like the following:

You can select a picture from the ones available by clicking on it with your left mouse button. Your desktop background will then change. To make the change permanent, click the Save Changes button at the bottom.

If you have a picture of your own, you can use this instead of the ones built-in to Windows 7. To set your own picture, click the dropdown list at the top, where it says Windows Desktop Background:

Here, we have moved to the Pictures Library folder to see what images are available. Another option is to click the Browse button. When you do, you'll see a dialogue box appear:

Browse to the folder where your images are and click OK. We have a folder called York with some images in it, so we've selected that one.

When you click OK, you'll see the images in that folder:

Select the image you want to appear on your desktop from those available. If you would like a slideshow of all the images in the folder, then click the Select All button. If you click the Select All button then the dropdown list at the bottom becomes available:

This list lets you choose how often each image in the slideshow is displayed before moving on to the next one. The default is 10 seconds.

Another area to play around with is the Picture Position. Click the black arrow to see a dropdown list:

Select each one in turn and watch what happens.

When you are happy with your choices, click Save Changes. You will then be taken back to the first screen:

Windows Colour

Another interesting area to play around is the Windows Colour area, circled in red in the image above. Click the link to see the following screen:

Things like the start menu, the taskbar, and the areas around programmes can all have the same colour scheme. The default is called Sky. Click one of the other colours above and watch what happens to your Taskbar at the bottom. Click the round Start button on the left of the Taskbar and you'll see that its colour too has changed. Uncheck the box that says "Enable transparency" and you'll see a deeper colour for the one you have chosen.

If you don't like the colours available, click the arrow to the left of Show Color Mixer. Then play around with the controls. To get back to the default colours, just click the colour square in the top left of the screen, which is Sky.

In the next section, we'll have a closer look at the Taskbar in Windows 7.

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Intro windows 7

The Windows 7 Desktop

When your computer starts for the first time, what you see is called the Desktop. It will look something like this:

The Desktop is split into two areas. The strip at the bottom, with the clock to the right and the round Start button to the left, is called the Taskbar. We explore this area in a different section (the Taskbar). But here's a closer look at it:

The Taskbar above is from Windows 7. Windows Vista users will see the round Start button on the left, but will have smaller icon just to the right of it. You'll still have the clock on the right hand side, though.

The rest of the Desktop is the space where all your programmes will appear when you start them up. This space contains a default background wallpaper, but it can also contain shortcuts to programmes, documents and folder.

You can change the default background wallpaper, and we'll do that next.

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Solutions for Android Phones Problems

Android Phones can cause problems which seem too complex to handle at the time but their solutions are really simple. Here are the solutions to the most common android phone problems that users have encountered:

1. My Android phone has frozen

You just need to restart your phone to kickstart a frozen android phone.

2. My smartphone Wi-Fi does not remain connected

This may solve the problem. Just go to Wi-Fi > Settings > Menu > Advanced and choose to stay connected to Wi-Fi during sleep.

3. Why do I keep running out of memory?

Among other reasons, the most prominent problem can be a full cache which affects the efficient running of apps. You can download apps like Cache Cleaner or Clean Master from Google Play to clean the cache for specific apps. This will free up some memory to resolve the issue. You will also have to either uninstall or move apps to an external SD card to free up more physical memory.

4. My SD card is no longer recognised

SD cards can get corrupted and the most effective solution is to reformat them using a desktop or laptop PC.  It works more often than trying to format it on the phone itself.

5. My screen is difficult to see in bright sunlight

You can increase screen brightness to maximum or use ‘anti-glare’ screen protector to see the screen in bright sunlight.

6. How do I remove apps?

Go to Settings > Applications > Manage Applications and then select the app you wish to uninstall. Now tap the Uninstall icon to remove the app.

7. My screen has cracked! Should I buy a new phone?

Cracked screens can be replaced as most phones have parts available from various suppliers both online and offline. Do your research before buying a new phone.

8. Entering my password takes forever!

Go to Settings > Security > Set up screen lock > choose enter a pattern rather than a password. Pattern is quicker and securer than a password.

9. My location is not always accurate in maps

Go to Settings > Location > check ‘Use GPS satellites’ and this will ensure much greater accuracy when navigating.

10. How do I wipe my Android smartphone completely?

Go to Settings > SD & Phone storage > Factory Data Restore. Go through the process twice to be completely sure that everything has been removed.

11. I dropped my phone in water!

Take the battery out as quickly as possible and dry as many parts of the phone as you can then leave it for 72 hours in a dry room. Try it again, it may work.

12. Can I make the text on my Android smartphone bigger?

Go to  message settings and use ‘Set text size’ option to increase the size of the displayed text.

13. Can I update my apps automatically?

Go to Google Play > Menu > ‘My Apps’ > select an app and choose auto-update option for trusted apps only. This option can be seen half-way down the screen.

14. I want to hide my search history.

Go to www.google.com/history in your Android browser and login. Here you can choose to remove your previous searches and not to save future searches.

15. How do I take screenshots?

Some smartphones will let you press the back key and the home button twice to take screenshots but the method varies for different android phone models.

16. How do I download music directly to my phone or tablet?

You can install Amazon MP3 from Google Play  which lets you purchase and install MP3 files directly to your phone without the need of a PC.

17. Some apps won’t install to my SD card

You may be able to move apps to an SD card using Settings > Manage Applications after installating the app in the phone memory.

18. How can I change the language on my phone?

Go to Settings > Language & keyboard and choose the language you require.

19. Can I remove pre-installed apps on my phone?

You can, but the process will require rooting the device and then downloading an app called Root Uninstaller. This can make your phone unstable and the amount of memory saved will not be worth it.

20. Can I speed up my Android phone?

There are apps available such as SetCPU which will let you speed up your phone through overclocking the processor. It will also let you slow down the processor to save memory. However, you need to be careful because you may end up frying your phone if you push it above the set maximum speed.

21. What’s the best way to backup my phone?

There are multiple solutions available to backup an Android phone and Titanium Backup PRO is considered to be one of the best solutions available. This app has the ability to backup every part of your phone and even export the backups through email or sync them to Dropbox.

22. How can I stop viruses from attacking my phone?

You can download anti-virus applications such as Kaspersky Mobile Security or AVG which offer real-time protection against a host of threats.

23. The volume on my phone is too quiet

If your Android phone suffer from low volume then you can download AudioBoost from the Android market. It can increase the volume up to 30% and is also activated from home screen widget.

24. The Live Wallpaper uses too much battery life

The simple solution is to use a static wall paper instead.

25. My clock keeps losing time.

This problem can occur if your phone’s clock updates time automatically from your network.  If the network clock is slow, so will be your phone clock. Go to Settings > Date & time > untick the ‘Automatic’ box at the top.

26. Can I block unwanted callers?

If your network provider does not offer this facility then you can download Extreme Call Blocker Droid. This app can block incoming calls but it is not the cheapest Android app available. You can explore other apps on the market too.

27. My phone is slow at times. Are there any tools to help?

You can make your phone fast if you remove all unnecessary apps and data you do not need. An app like System Tuner Pro can tune many parts of your phone automatically to ensure the best possible performance.

28. My phone has been stolen. Can I track it?

You can install a third party app to help track your phone if it gets stolen. PhoneLocator Pro can remotely track a phone using GPS as well as let you wipe or lock the phone.

29. Why can’t I use iTunes with my Android device?

You can use iTunes with doubleTwist AirSync which lets you synchronise media between iTunes and an Android phone or tablet without a physical connection. However, you won’t be able to access DRM protected media.

30. How do I close an app that keeps freezing my phone?

Go to Settings > Applications > ‘Manage applications’. Now choose the app that is misbehaving from the list and tap ‘Force stop’. If the app continues to misbehave try to uninstall and then reinstall it.

31. Can I close running apps quickly?

You can use the default task manager in Android to deal with running apps. It also lets you manage all of your running apps with a couple of taps.

32. Why does auto-correct not know all the words I need to use?

Auto-correct cannot possibly know all the words but you can add new ones quickly and easily. When you type a word, look for the ‘+’ sign below the text field, tap it and the word will be added to your dictionary for future use. The more words you add, the more accurate your typing will become.

33. Switching between keyboards takes forever!

Simply press and hold the ‘123’ button on the keyboard. You will be given the list of all the keyboards installed from where you can choose the desired one in just about a second.

34. Why does my screen turn off when charging?

Go to Settings > Applications > Development and check the ‘Stay awake’ option to keep the screen on during charging.

35. Can I reinstall a paid app?

You can reinstall a paid app from the Android Market. Go to  ‘My Market Account’ >  orders tab which include a list of the purchased apps. You can choose an app and then tap ‘Install’ to complete the process. Google Play does not charge you for reinstalling an app.

36. How do I know if I have the latest version of Android on my phone?

Go to Settings > About phone > ‘System software updates’ > click ‘Check now’. You will be notified if any new updates are available or all the updates have already been installed on your phone.

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